


XX

by WhenDovesCry



Category: Figure Skating RPF
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2018-03-07
Packaged: 2019-01-27 06:20:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 22
Words: 57,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12575624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhenDovesCry/pseuds/WhenDovesCry





	1. Chapter 1

## November 2016

## 

### Scott

###  The NHK banquet is a lighthearted but strange affair. After everyone lines up at a long buffet, an entertainer dressed in head-to-toe purple takes the stage and urges the crowd through sit-down choreography to Uptown Funk. Scott plays along goofily, making Tessa (who, as politely as possible, refrains from participating) laugh. After dinner, they mingle with other skaters, joking about the “terrifying” (Scott’s word) mascots that “ambushed” (also his word) the last few minutes of the gala that afternoon. They contend with two young Japanese singles skaters who trail behind Scott all night, giggling. When the girls finally work up to asking him to pose for photos with them, he hisses at Tessa through clenched teeth.  
“ _Don’t you dare leave me!_ ”  
She grins with great amusement as she joins in the photos, wrapping her arm around each of the tiny women. The drinks flow, and everything seems funnier and funnier as the night goes on. It’s a good time. 

As the party winds down, Tessa and Scott leave together to walk back to their rooms. She carries her shoes in one hand, and he carries his tie. In the hall outside of her room, Tessa stops suddenly and peers past Scott.

”Sorry. Just checking to see if Nura and Wakaba are following you. I don’t see them yet but you better get to your room!”  
Scott winces at the thought, then pretends to look nervously over his shoulders. Taking them both by surprise, he suddenly lets rip a huge burp. He and Tessa stop and stare at each other in startled silence, then both erupt in laughter, doubled over and unable to breathe.  
Finally, Tessa catches her breath enough to speak.

“Well gee, I mean, with charm like that, who could blame those girls!”  
Scott gives her a ‘ha ha very funny’ look that quickly turns to a real smile, and pulls her in for a hug.  
She leans her face against his shoulder. He can feel that she’s still giggling.  
He feels how warm she is, how small and strong. His perfect fit. The feeling takes his breath away for just a second, and he squeezes a little tighter. She squeezes back.  
_The best_ , he thinks to himself, without really thinking.

Then it hits him: she’s going to let go of him and go into her room - of course she will, what else would she do?  
But he doesn’t want her to. He feels lonely at the thought, and sad. When she does pull back a moment later, his expression has changed.

“Uh oh, too much sake” she teases gently. “You better get to bed.”  
She gives his arm a squeeze, and he watches her door close.

Scott goes to his room. He splashes water on his face from the small Japanese sink and lies staring at the ceiling from his small Japanese bed.  
His mind is racing and he turns Tessa over and over in his mind. Gradually, he consciously realizes something that has probably subconsciously been the case for who knows how long - months? Years?  
He's in love with her.  
It’s not just the skating, it’s not just the comeback.  
It’s simple. It’s her.  
Now what the hell is he supposed to do. 

...

They travel back to Montreal and settle into their (new) old routine. Scott does his best to be as ‘normal’ as possible, but it’s not always easy. One day shortly after they return, he hangs back at the boards and watches Tessa as she transitions effortlessly from moving through a twizzle sequence to laughing heartily with Patch. Crazy beautiful.  
Scott shakes his head and turns away. He needs to stop staring at her like that. 

Grimacing, he reflects that his newfound feelings for her are like a inconveniently-timed boner. Something that normally meant excitement, pleasure, joy was instead awkward, embarrassing, excruciating.  
He’s not used to this - he’s always been confident with girls and has never been one to pine from afar for very long before making his move. But this is very, very different.  
There’s so much history between them. And the stakes are so high.

There are flashes of hope, moments when they gaze at each other, share a joke no one else gets, hold hands a little longer than they otherwise might, that Scott allows himself to think, _this isn’t just me, she feels it too_. But then there are many other moments when he’s forced to admit he really isn’t sure at all how Tessa feels about him.  
One day at Gadbois, he overhears her talking to Marie-France about her plans to go to a party that night. When Marie asks Tessa whether she has a date for it, he thinks his heart legitimately stops beating until he hears Tessa say “Jenny…” He heaves a sigh, relieved this time, but also knowing full well she could just have easily have said ‘Jeremy’, or ‘Jon’, or who knows. 

But while keeping this to himself is torture, confessing to her seems so risky. What if she felt so uncomfortable she couldn’t skate with him? Or what if one or both of them were so thrown off that they lost their momentum and their comeback was ruined?  
He feels miserable not telling her how he feels, but at least he’s keeping it together and, partnership-wise, they’re as strong as ever.  
He reminds himself daily, hourly that keeping this to himself is best. At least for now.


	2. Chapter 2

##  December 2016 

###  Tessa 

###  One day before they leave for the Grand Prix Final, Tessa and Scott are at the gym. Tessa stretches on the floor in a corner, watching Scott put through his paces swinging around a medicine ball while balancing on one foot.  
She feels proud watching him, of how strong he is, how focused.  
It blows her mind to think how much he’s matured in the last few years. He’s so much less cocky than he used to be, even though he has as much reason as ever to be confident.  
She smiles to herself thinking of the young Japanese skaters fan-girling over him at NHK, as though he were a lesser known member of One Direction. 

Truth be told, it’s not unusual for women to take an interest in Scott, and Tessa has noticed that to be even more the case lately. He has matured a lot physically - he definitely looks more like a man than a boy now.   
“Must be the flow,” she can imagine him saying, and she rolls her eyes a little and smiles to herself. The hair is good, but it’s not just that. 

She feels a little twinge wondering if he’s got anyone on his radar, he hasn’t mentioned anybody lately, but he wouldn’t necessarily tell her, and with Tinder, Bumble, whatever else, it’s pretty easy to keep things on the down low -- but she stops herself short.   
After years of practice, she has honed her jealousy suppression skills. This is a crucial to the success of their complex relationship. 

She continues thinking. Things have been going so well this season and particularly in the last few weeks, Scott has seemed so present and focused when they’re together.   
But her mind drifts again, _has he been especially sweet lately? STOP_ , she tells herself, _why would you think about that?_   
She reminds herself that she has nothing but Admiration and Respect for her Figure Skating Partner and firmly turns her mind to visualizing their short dance. 

...

Days later, they are at the airport en route to Marseilles for the Final. An airline employee checking them in, barely looking up from her computer, announces in a bored voice that they won’t be able to sit together on their flights. Before Tessa can say anything, Scott speaks up.

“Are you sure? We’d really prefer to sit together if possible.”  
Tessa is taken by surprise. She is so used to Scott telling her not to worry about sitting together when they travel, it’s only a few hours, we’ll (ie, he’ll) be asleep anyway.   
She gives Scott a grateful look as the employee sighs over the seating arrangements.   
Ultimately, the best they can do is sit together on the short Paris-Marseilles flight.

After they board, Tessa cozies into her seat and smiles at Scott when he turns around from several rows up and winks at her. As she tries to fall asleep, her mind keeps drifting back to Scott. She’s runs over a top-secret mental check-list she has been compiling of all the little ‘things’ he has done lately. Everytime she allows herself to review it, she feels a little hum, even though another part of her knows going there is a bad idea. 

... 

Finally, after hours of travel, they arrive in Marseilles. 

They venture out for an informal group dinner. As the gang of skaters wanders the streets of the city after finishing at the restaurant, Tessa spots a French chain store she follows on Instagram and trots out in front of the group to get a good look in the window while everyone else catches up.   
Suddenly, she is aware that Scott has followed and is looking in the window over her shoulder.

“This is a Tessa place for sure” he says confidently, and she turns to smile at him in surprise.  
“Oh yeah?”  
“Yeah,” he says thoughtfully. “A lot of sweaters with cats”.  
“Sweaters with cats?!” Tessa squeaks incredulously, and they laugh together as they walk on. 

They stroll on, past a small jewellery shop.  
“Hey! That’s a latch!”  
Tessa points through the glass at a dainty gold bracelet on display. It has a simple hook-and-eye closure that looks like the latch on a backyard gate. Further to her surprise, not only is Scott paying attention at all, but he's peering through the glass at the bracelet.  
“Do you like it?,” he asks earnestly.  
“Yeah, I do” she replies softly, suddenly feeling a bit shy.  
Tessa steals a glance at Scott, waiting for him to make a joke, but he has his eyes trained on the bracelet.   
Unsure what else to say, she turns to keep walking and he follows.

Later that evening, Eric sends Tessa a photo he took of her and Scott walking ahead of the group under the twinkling Marseilles street lights. She posts it to her instagram and captions it with a French flag emoji.  
_That was a nice night_ , she thinks to herself.


	3. Chapter 3

##  December 2016 

###  Scott 

###  The Grand Prix Final goes extremely well. The win doesn’t hurt, but Scott’s thoughts are mainly trained on Tessa. He clasps her hand as they take their bows. He has to remind himself to let go when they climb onto the podium. They exchange amused looks when they see the ‘flag’ - a crummy animation on the Jumbotron. The medals are definitely not metal, and Alex Shibutani hugs Scott but forgets to hug Tessa.   
They secretly laugh about it all through gritted, smiling teeth, and it feels to Scott like they’re the only two people in France.   
After the anthem ends, he scrambles off the podium and reaches up to Tessa’s waist and lifts her down. She smiles warmly at him, and his heart flips. They skate a victory lap huddled together under a (real) Canadian flag and he watches as she sweetly waves to the crowd.  
_I’m going to talk to her tonight_ , he thinks.

They leave the ice and walk through to the change area. Scott is lost in thought, thinking he’ll see if he can manage to get Tessa to himself at some point, when he overhears Guillaume talking to her about plans for the evening.

“...really nice - straight! - friend in town. And hot! And smart. You will love him! He already thinks you are beautiful. Come meet him with me, we’ll get drinks!”  
To Scott’s horror, Tessa, usually decidedly conservative about set-ups, and even more so during a competitive season, responds with a little shrug.  
“You know what, yeah! That might be fun and you know I trust your taste - sure, I’ll come for drinks tonight!”

Scott can feel his face get hot and his stomach drop. He was not expecting this. As they sit to take their skates off, she turns to him.  
“Hey guess what -- Guillaume wants me to meet his ‘hot, smart, straight’ friend and I think I’m going to go for it!”   
She says “hot, smart, straight” in a French accent, imitating Guillaume. It’s so cute, and Scott can’t stand it. He avoids eye contact, grunts.

“I dunno, I mean are you sure it’s a good idea? You don’t always make great decisions when you drink”.  
Tessa is clearly taken aback.  
“I don’t?” she asks quietly.  
Scott is immediately filled with regret but has nothing else to say. They remove their skates in silence and get on the bus to the hotel without speaking to each other. 

In his room, Scott stands under a scalding shower, cursing himself for being such an asshole. Not only did he hurt Tessa’s feelings for no good reason - she’s not exactly a problem drinker-, but he definitely did not convince her to not meet the hot French guy.  
_Fuck._  
Once out of the shower, he texts Chiddy and Javi. He can’t sit in his room while Tessa’s out finding love with Guillaume's friend. The boys make a plan to hit the town. 

They start drinking in Javi’s room. Scott relishes the burn as the liquor slides down his throat. He’s got a decent buzz going by the time they leave the hotel.

They happen on a nightclub that seems pretty happening, wander in and head straight for the bar.   
After downing a few more drinks, the room blurs slightly and the boys find themselves on the dance floor. 

Before long, a young blonde is orbiting around Scott, closing in on him.   
As she comes within a few feet, he takes an experimental step toward her and she responds by enthusiastically whipping around and backing her bum into his groin.  
“Whoa nice to meet you!” he yells into the pulsing music, surprised. If the blonde hears him, she shows no sign of it.  
But he can’t deny the feeling of her body pressed into him is a good one, so he puts his non-drink hand on her hip and attempts to lead them through some form of sloppy dance. 

After a few songs, the blonde yells something into his ear that he can’t hear (probably in French, anyway) and then makes the sign for smoking with her hand and points at the door.   
Scott nods ok, unsure whether she’s telling him she’s ready to move on from him or wants him to follow, but she grabs his hand and leads him outside, which clears things up.   
The cold air hits him, he remembers what happened with Tessa, and his body tenses.  
But in the next moment, the blonde is reaching up to his neck and pulling his mouth to hers. He feels indifferent but goes along with it, vaguely hopeful that kissing or whatever else this girl has in mind will distract him again.   
She tastes like cigarettes. 

They make out for a bit, and it’s fine, but Scott is mostly relieved when the girl’s friends show up, giggling. They are clearly telling her that it’s time to leave.   
She looks up into Scott’s face, pouting and murmuring in French. He smiles half-heartedly as she fishes his phone out of his pocket and puts her number in.  
“Bon nuit” he says to the girls’ backs as they walk away. Even if he lived here, he knows he’d never call.

...

In the morning, Scott wakes wretchedly to a hangover and the harsh realization that Tessa is likely a) deeply hurt by what he said to her and b) maybe possibly madly in love with Guillaume’s friend.   
He shudders when he remembers his little hook-up from the night before and heaves himself out of bed and into sweats, resigned to the fact he has no time to shower before he needs to catch the bus to gala practice. 

Downstairs, he spies Tessa across the lobby and makes a sharp turn to busy himself in the continental breakfast nook. He shoves a croissant in his mouth and chews miserably. He hasn’t worked out what to do yet.  
He nabs a spot beside Chiddy on the bus, and though he is mortified, forces himself to look up as Tessa hurries past. She avoids eye contact, but looks more sad than angry.   
The worst.   
He cringes, feeling horrible. He clenches his fists, squeezes his eyes shut and thinks - _get your fucking shit together, Moir_.   
Whether Tessa made a love connection with Guillaume’s friend is beside the point - he’s got to apologize to her. 

At the arena, the skaters cluster in small groups on the ice and await instruction on choreography for the group number that will close the gala. Scott circles around, trying to get his wits about him and looking for an opportunity to speak to Tessa. She’s so private, and he knows if he makes any kind of scene it will only make this worse for her.   
And this is pretty public - the ice is littered with other skaters, and a few hundred fans line the boards to watch them practice.  
_That, and she’s avoiding me_ , he thinks.

Scott skates around with Chiddy, guzzling from two water bottles to quell his hangover. He steals looks at Tessa across the crowd, and cringes to see how miserable she looks.   
But then she finds Eric and chats with him, visibly brightening a little. Guillaume joins Eric and Tessa, and Tessa leans her head on Guillaume’s shoulder.  
Scott scowls looking at Guillaume, thinking, _you started this_ , even though he knows as soon as he thinks it that it’s unfair. This is his own fault. 

The skaters are called together so the choreographer can address them as a group. Tessa sticks between Eric and Guillaume. Scott stands nearby but not too close, mulling whether he can get a word in.   
He skates away from the group under the pretense of gesturing to the sound person to turn down to the music so they can hear the choreographer better, and when he returns to the group he takes the opportunity to stand closer to Tessa than he had been before, just on the other side of Guillaume. He tries to catch her eye, but she’s not going for it.   
She backs away a little to stand with Javi, and nestles her head onto his shoulder.   
_Everyone but me_ , thinks Scott. _I guess I deserve that_. 

The choreographer directs the skaters to move to the top of the rink. Scott resigns himself to the reality that he may need to wait until they’re off the ice before he can get her attention, which is just as tricky with so many people around and separate men’s and women’s dressing rooms. But his heart starts pounding when he turns his head and sees that Tessa is shyly coming toward him.   
She glances up at him very briefly, then turns away from him but stays close. This is his chance.   
Without further hesitation, he comes right in behind her and wraps his arms around her shoulders, pressing his cheek against hers.

“Tess, I’m sorry,” he breathes into her ear.   
She makes a tiny sound he knows instinctively means “I know”. Flooded with relief, he lets her go and skates off.   
When he looks over at her, she is chatting more easily and her expression looks lighter. 

A few hours later, the gala starts and they wait in the wings for their turn to skate. The mood between them is still a little fragile, but way better than the morning. Scott swallows, dreading the answer he’ll get, but he knows he needs to ask.  
“So, last night, Gui’s friend… man of your dreams?” he winces slightly as he waits for her answer.  
Tessa scrunches her nose and gives him a tortured look.  
“Man purse,” she grimaces.  
Scott lets out a huge laugh, probably bigger than necessary, but he’s so relieved she didn’t like the guy, even if he does lives in France and, realistically, there wasn’t likely much of a risk there anyway. Tessa laughs too and the thaw continues. 

... 

The next day, their flight leaves Marseille at 1 pm. Although they need to leave for the airport around 11, Scott dashes out in search of the jewelry store they peered into a few nights earlier, hoping that it’s already open.


	4. Chapter 4

##  December 2016 

###  Tessa 

###  Once back in Montreal, there are only 10 or so training days until Tessa and Scott head home for the holidays. Scott apologized to Tessa at GPF for what he said, she has forgiven him, and they haven’t spoken about it again. She spends some time analyzing it, why he said what he did - _does he really think I’m_ that _bad when I drink? Does he not want me hanging out with Guillaume?_ Ultimately, though, she talks herself through moving past it. She reminds herself that Scott has matured so much in the last few years, she forgets that she spent years of her life navigating his temper. It so rarely rears its ugly head now that she forgets how it used to be.  
_Must have been a flashback to old Scott_ , she thinks. 

What does worry her is that, genuinely unlike him, he is quite quiet when they get home. He smiles at her jokes, and puts in his usual stellar effort in training. But he doesn’t say much on their drives to and from the rink, she notices that he doesn’t razz the guys at the rink the way he usually does, and, most notably, he’s a lot less bossy than usual. He’s subdued. After nearly two decades of analysing Scott’s moods, this one worries her. She can’t figure it out.

Finally, it’s the last training day before Christmas break. Tessa makes her own way to the rink because she’s taking an earlier flight to London to make sure she’s back in time for a Christmas party she’s gone to every year since she was a kid. Scott is leaving for home a little later, to get one more session in at the gym before he goes. 

After they run through the back half of their free dance once last time, Marie hoots from the boards.  
“Whoo! Yeah that was good! Scott you look so emotional, it was beautiful!”  
Tessa lets out a little laugh at Marie’s exaggerated enthusiasm, but casts a sideways glance in Scott’s direction, and he’s not laughing. He looks lost in thought. Tessa feels a little pang, hopes he doesn’t misinterpret her laugh. _What is up with him?_

Finally it’s time for Tessa to hit the road. Even though she’s on a tight schedule, she delays a little, worrying how her goodbye with Scott is going to go. Whether it’s the best plan or not, she starts making her rounds of the rink, wishing everyone merry christmas, leaving Scott for last.   
When she finally gets back around to him, she counsels herself not to be awkward. As she walks up to him, she takes a deep breath, and smiles as she reaches her arms out. He scoops her up in a tight hug.  
“Merry Christmas,” she whispers.

When Scott finally lets her go, he holds her at arm's length for a moment and looks at her intently, looking like he has something to say but saying nothing.   
Tessa can’t handle the intensity of whatever is going on between them, and she feels the urge to run.  
“Please tell your family merry christmas from me”, she says quickly, pecks him on the cheek and scurries away. 

She feels ill as she walks to the car - he didn’t say a word to her. Are they leaving things on a bad note? And if so, why? She is perplexed, and concerned.

Just as she reaches the car, she hears the quick shuffle of jogging feet on the pavement behind her, and before she can see, she knows instinctively it’s Scott. She turns just as he catches up.

“Hey!” she says brightly, grateful that she gets a do-over on their goodbye, whatever the reason. But Scott is white as a sheet and Tessa feels herself tense up.

He stammers, “I, uhhh, I have something for you...”  
His words trail off. Tessa searches his face but he is looking down at the item he holds out to her in his hand.   
_Is he blushing?_   
She feels her heart pounding in her chest.

“You do?”  
They haven’t exchanged Christmas gifts in something like 15 years, when he gave her a giant stuffed Marvin the Martian she slept on in the car on their way to practices as kids.  
She follows his gaze downward, and sees that he is holding a long narrow cardboard jewellery box tied simply with raffia.  
It looks so odd in his hand - the last thing she'd expect to see there.

“Should I ...open it?” she asks dumbly.  
Scott still says nothing but holds it out to her, and Tessa thinks she has never seen him look so unsure of himself. It completely freaks her out.  
She takes the package and unties it, noticing that her hands are shaking, and manages to lift the lid of the box.  
Below a thin layer of tissue paper is the dainty gold latch bracelet they spotted together through the window on the street in Marseilles.

“Oh!” she gasps, genuinely surprised. “How did you.. You remembered...?” she is searching for words but struggling.   
Finally she manages to look up into his eyes.  
“I love it."

She lurches toward him and they hug each other hard. She feels Scott burry his face in hair, feels his breath on her neck. She thinks she feels his heart beating through him against her chest, but then, maybe that’s her heart.  
Finally, they disengage and she looks up at him, realizing she still doesn’t quite understand what's going on. He is definitely blushing, but he looks much less stricken - and maybe relieved?

“You better hit the road, kiddo. Don’t want to be late.” And with that, he reaches up to her face and tucks her hair behind her ear - a simple gesture he’s made a million times before, but in this moment, it feels different.   
Tessa is so taken off guard by the whole scene she can hardly breathe.  
“Yeah,” is all she manages. They smile at each other and she drives off.

...

As Tessa waits for her flight, she takes the bracelet out of the box and manages to get it on her wrist without having to ask a stranger for help with the closure. She stares at it, puzzling over how Scott came to buy it when they were so tight for time in France.   
She shakes her head and realizes, most importantly - it’s not how he bought it, but why did he buy it?

When she gets home, Tessa's mom notices the bracelet and comments how pretty it is.  
“It’s from Marseilles!” says Tessa happily, “it’s a latch.” She spends a lot of time over the next day looking down at it on her wrist and running her finger over the gold chain. She feels a little flush of happiness every time she looks at it. 

But her simple, happy appreciation for Scott's gift gradually gives way to confusion and anxiety. Questions.

On Christmas night, Tessa lies in bed, unable to sleep. She replays Scott giving her the bracelet in her mind over and over again, and scrutinizes how she reacted... She’d hardly said anything. Had she even thanked him?  
_What if he doesn’t know how much it means to me,_ she tortures herself.

And when she allows herself to start thinking about why he might have gone to the trouble of buying her the bracelet, her heart starts beating so hard in her chest she swears she can hear it in the quiet of her room.   
But then she thinks, _What if I’m reading too much into this?_

Finally she falls asleep, but spends most of Boxing Day obsessing about what Scott might be thinking, about her reaction, about her.   
Over afternoon Scrabble, her sister gives her a quizzical look and asks if she’s ok, she seems a little out of it. Tessa responds with a smile that she’s great, just looking for that elusive 7 letter word amongst her tiles. 

That night, Tessa tosses around in her bed restlessly again, still mulling the same two minutes over and over. Finally, she chastises herself.  
_This is stupid! It’s Scott. I just need to talk to him._  
Eventually, she falls asleep, convinced she’ll just text him in the morning, no problem, this is not a big deal. 

But when morning comes, she stares at her phone and feels paralyzed. What should she say? What’s the right tone to strike? Is she just shooting him a text to thank him?  
“Yo Scottie, lovin the blang, thx again!” _NO_.  
“Dear Scott, I can’t even begin to express…” _NO_.  
Or should she propose they... get together? They never do that when they’re home for holidays, unless there’s some event they’re both invited to.   
If she’s misreading this, she could be imposing on him, not to mention subjecting herself to major humiliation.   
She wishes she could get Jordan’s advice, but she definitely can’t do that. This is Scott she’s freaking out over. She's not ready to tell anyone about this, even her sister. But why is this so hard?  
_Jesus_.   
She puts her phone down and sighs. 

Later that morning, Tessa and her mom and sister hit some Boxing Week sales at a few high end London shops. Tessa is pleased when she realizes in their third store that she hasn’t worried about the Scott situation for a whole 20 minutes.

Around noon, they pop into one of their favourite bistros and order salads and glasses of white wine. They aren’t usually ones to partake before 5 pm, but _it is the holidays, after all_ , they say to each other happily.  
Tessa sips her wine and quickly feels buzzzzzed. She giggles with Jane and Jordan, and feels more lighthearted than she has in what seems like ages. 

After they finish eating, her mom and sister pop to the bathroom. Tessa, emboldened by the wine’s effects, pulls her phone out of her purse, whispering under her breath. “Fuck it."

Before she can stop herself, types a text to Scott.  
“Hey! I’m going to be near Ilderton later today, I thought i might pop in for a quick hello!? :)”  
As soon as she hits send, she stares at her phone and realizes she's not breathing.  
_What have i done??_ She presses her eyes shut.  
_It’s ok,_ she tries to talk herself off the ledge. _If he doesn’t want you to come over, he’ll just say he’s busy._

But when she opens her eyes, a message from Scott is already flashing on the screen of her phone.  
“VIRTCH VISITS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”  
Tessa lets out a delighted laugh when she sees it, undeniably relieved. Immediately, a second text from Scott comes in.  
“Cmon down T!”  
“Ok!” she responds, “See you later this afternoon :)”

When Kate and Jordan return to the table, Tessa is beaming.  
“Well, I dare say, day drinking suits you!” Jordan teases and they all laugh together as they leave the restaurant.  
“Mum,” asks Tessa casually as they stroll down the street, “Can I borrow your car in a few hours?”  
“Sure, honey,” says Kate. “I’m not going anywhere.” 

When Tessa gets home, she skips up the stairs to get ready to go to the Moirs. But when she reaches her room, she finds herself staring at her suitcase. What the heck is she supposed to wear? Dressing up to any extent seems way too weird, but she can’t deny she wants to look good.   
She settles on high waisted jeans and a soft sweater with a cute tie at the neck. She looks in the mirror and hikes up her sleeve just a little to make sure the bracelet is visible on her wrist. 

She goes downstairs, grabs the keys, and kisses her mother’s cheek.  
“Where are you off to, honey?” asks Jane. A perfectly reasonable question, but Tessa freezes.  
“The Moirs,” she says as casually as she can.  
“Oh! Really? Well that’s nice, i can’t remember the last time you went over there. Please give them my love. Should I expect you back for dinner?” Again, Tessa freezes. She has no idea how long she’ll be - she hasn’t dared let herself think about what might happen when she gets there.  
“Umm, maybe don’t count on me for dinner, mum. I’m not really sure what the plan is.”   
And that is the truth.


	5. Chapter 5

##  December 2016 

###  Tessa 

###  Tessa parks in the Moirs’ large parking area, peers at herself for a moment in the rearview mirror and feels irrationally nervous.  
_Alrighty_. She gulps, gets out, and walks to the house. Before she can knock on the door, it swings open. Scott’s mom, Alma, is standing just inside with her arms outstretched. 

“Tessa!” she says warmly and wraps her in a big hug.  
“Hi Alma, it’s so nice to see you!” Tessa says over Alma’s shoulder as she is squeezed lovingly. In the next moment, Scott’s dad Joe is in the entryway, too.  
“Hiya kiddo” he says and he hugs her, too, but much more gingerly.  
“We’re so pleased you could stop by!” says Alma, “what brings you to the area?” It occurs to Tessa that she probably should have thought about that.  
“Oooh uhhh my mum asked me to pick something up…?” She knows it sounds like she was going to say more, she decides last second to leave it there. It's simpler that way.  
“Oh I see,” says Alma, nodding politely but sounding vaguely unconvinced. 

Just then, Scott arrives at the top of the stairs, having come up from the basement. His hair’s a little wet and he’s just pulling a t-shirt down. Tessa catches a fleeting glimpse of his bare torso and she feels her face flush.  
“Hi!” -- “Hey!” they say at the same time and then both stop short, awkwardly.  
In the next moment, Scott lunges forward and hugs Tessa hard enough that she tips back on her heels a little. She's briefly caught in the moment, eyes closed, and smelling clean Scott.  
But her eyes flash open and she sees Alma and Joe looking on at them, obviously curious. She quickly pats Scott’s back mechanically, and slips out of his embrace. 

“Well, come on in!” says Alma, mercifully moving them into the open family room/kitchen area at the back of the house. Scott’s brother, Charlie, and his wife, Nicole, are there with their two little kids. Nicole is also very pregnant.

“Oh my gosh!” says Tessa coming toward them with her arms open for hugs. “Well gee, congrats you guys! You must be excited!”  
“That’s one way of putting it,” quips Nicole, returning the hug.  
“Miss Virtue, you’re as lovely as ever”, Charlie says, pecking Tessa on the cheek - a ladies’ man in the manner typical of the Moir brothers. 

Tessa looks over at their kids, glued to the TV.  
“Oh wow, they’re getting so big!”  
"Quinn, Shea, do you remember Tessa?” Nicole calls over to the kids. “She does skating with uncle Scott.” 

Shea is around two and definitely does not care who Tessa is, but nevertheless toddles in their general direction. Quinn is four or so, and stands up with her back to the TV and says proudly, “We’re havin’ a sleepover at grandma n’ grandpa’s!”  
“Oh that sounds fun!” says Tessa sweetly.

“Thank god for Alma and Joe,” Nicole murmurs to Tessa. “We only have a week or so til this one makes his debut” - patting her stomach- “and I’m dying for a good night’s sleep.”  
“I quite literally can only imagine,” says Tessa, nodding sympathetically.

“You two better get going if you’re going to make your reservation!” Alma warns Charlie and Nicole, and taps her watch.  
“Mama knows,” says Charlie under his breath, chuckling.  
“We’re eating at 5:15 so i can be in bed by 8,” Nicole explains ruefully to Tessa. 

Charlie wraps one arm around Scott and one arm around Tessa, and calls out to his kids.  
“You kids be good for grandma and grandpa! And if you’re not, Uncle Scott and Auntie Tessa are going to take care of it.”  
The kids are clearly unphased by the warning, but for what feels like the 100th time in 10 minutes, Tessa feels her face flush, this time at the mere, vague suggestion of her and Scott as a couple - even if only as a couple of enforcers.

Nicole kisses each of the kids goodbye. They fuss a little realizing she’s leaving.  
“Hi guys, what are you watching?” asks Tessa enthusiastically, dropping to her knees and shuffling toward the kids.  
“Thank you!” mouths Nicole as her kids take an interest in Tessa, and she is able to slip away unnoticed.  
“Minions!” yell the kids in unison, bee-lining to Tessa to begin their ascent, climbing her like a tree.  
“Minions?” repeats Tessa with a laugh as they clamour around her, stepping their tiny feet onto her thighs and pulling on her arms. 

She forgets herself for a moment - where she is and what brought her here. She is laughing harder and harder as she’s overtaken by the kids.  
Scott is standing over them and Tessa glances up in their usual way, seeking his reaction to the hilarity of it all. Scott is indeed smiling down at her but expression isn't quite what she was expecting, and she remembers herself and feels shy again. 

Luckily for her, Scott does snap into action in the next moment and drops to the floor, tumbling toward the three of them like a giant rolling pin. All three of Tessa, Quinn and Shea laugh and shriek. Scott manages to get Quinn and Shea each under one arm.  
“I got them, Tessa! If you can make it to the couch, you’re home free!”  
Tessa, laughing, crawls on her hands and knees to the couch and scrambles up.  
“Phew!” she says, as Scott disentangles from the kids, plops down on the couch beside her and flashes her a big grin. She feels her breath shorten as she smiles back, forcing herself to hold his eye.

But she doesn’t have too long to be flustered - the kids are going full on crazy, running around the family room with rosy cheeks and devising clumsy attacks on her to drag her out of home free. Each time they get close to her, Scott reaches over and swats them away, which they love - as does Tessa.  
“You kids are going to be too wound up to eat your supper!” calls Alma from the stove.  
“Grandma’s right,” says Scott, reasonably. “Why don’t we just watch the movie for a bit.”  
“We wanna watch with you,” says Quinn, and Shea stands beside her nodding. He definitely takes his cues from his sister.

Tessa and Scott help the kids up onto the couch, and the four of them cuddle in together to watch. Tessa feels Scott shuffle a little closer to her, and by the time everyone is settled, their shoulders are just barely touching.  
They each have a kid in their laps. Tessa takes a moment to savour the feeling of warm, sticky little Shea snuggled up to her, with his head leaning back on her chest. She rests her cheek on top of his sweet little head. 

They watch to the end of Despicable Me. When the credits roll, Quinn scrambles down from Scott’s lap, and turns around to look at them.  
"We want to go to the park”. “Park” sounds like “pawk.” Shea nods dozzily from Tessa’s lap.  
“Sorry, Quinnie” calls Alma - who hears everything - from the kitchen, “dinner is in 5 minutes. Why don’t you go wash your hands?”  
"Yep, washin’ up time,” says Scott, pushing himself up from the couch, and turning to lift Shea off Tessa’s lap. He tries to put Shea down, but Shea wraps his legs around him, and Scott sighs with exaggerated resignation.

“Ok, Uncle Sherpa it is.”  
“Uncle Serpa!” yells Quinn excitedly, reaching her hands up.  
Scott stoops down and picks her up, too. The kids grip onto him, as Quinn moves to his back and Shea clings to his front like a baby orangutan.  
Scott makes a show of staggering to the washroom as though they’re weighing him down, but Tessa knows full well this is easily within his abilities. She giggles at the sweet scene.

“T, we’re going to need your assistance with the taps,” declares Scott in a goofy voice.  
“Of course!” She follows closely behind and gives the kids little tickles, which delights them and makes them grip more tightly onto their uncle.  
Suddenly, Scott’s arm shoots out at an angle and lands a squeeze on Tessa’s waist.  
“Ahhh!” she laugh screams and jumps a foot in the air, surprised.  
“Aha, you see that kids? She can dish it out but she can’t take it!” says Scott, arriving at the door of the bathroom.  
Tessa reaches around them and turns on the tap, catching Scott's eye in the mirror. 

Finally arriving at the big kitchen table, Scott, still carrying both kids, plunks them each down at their seats. Joe and Alma carry plates of food from the counter.  
“Tessa, I certainly hope you’re joining us for dinner, because I set a place for you!” says Alma, wagging a joking finger at her. Tessa blushes a little (again), realizing she hadn’t even considered whether she was invited to dinner- she just assumed she was.  
“Oh, she’s staying,” Scott interjects definitively, shooting Tessa a look. His expression sends a zing down her spine.  
“Oh yes, I’d love to, thank you!” Tessa manages. All but Alma take seats around the table.  
“Wine?” Alma, standing at the fridge, asks Tessa, holding up a giant bottle of Jackson Triggs - not the sort of wine typically served at the Virtues’.  
“Absolutely,” she smiles.  
“Grandma and grandpa juice,” says Joe with a wink. 

Quinn and Shea do pretty well, managing to remain seated for 3-5 minutes and eating at least some of what is placed in front of them.  
The grown-ups have a great time - Alma loves to take trips down memory lane, and they humour her happily. Joe loves it too, but says a lot less, and doesn’t let any of their wine glasses get low, which certainly contributes to the merriment. 

Eventually, Joe gets up to put the kids to bed, and when he returns he sits back in his place and pours the last of the big bottle between their glasses.  
Tessa has been having such a nice time, it’s only then she realizes how much she’s had to drink.  
“Whoooo” she breathes, sticking her tongue out and closing one eye.  
“Oh good heavens, we’ve intoxicated you!” declares Alma with a hearty laugh. Everyone else laughs, too.  
“I’m not even sure I can drive home!” Tessa thinks out loud, before she has considered the implications of that.  
Alma responds with a wave of her hand.

“Oh, that’s no problem at all, you’ll stay here! You can sleep in Scott’s bed.”  
Silence grips the table. Tessa stops breathing and she thinks maybe Scott does too.  
“And of course we’ll put him on the hide-a-bed!” Alma adds quickly, and all four of them burst out laughing again.  
“Well thank GOD for that!” yelps Scott, rolling his eyes and pulling on the collar of his T-shirt.  
Tessa feels so hot in her face she thinks she may burst into flame, but hopefully everyone is tipsy enough they won’t notice.

“Are you sure? I don’t want to impose,” Tessa asks, but also knowing full well that she really shouldn’t drive and none of the others should, either.  
“No question!” says Alma, pressing her palm on the table.  
“Thank you so much - you’ve already been too kind, as usual. I’m just going to text my mum to let her know I won’t be back tonight.” 

Standing up to find her purse definitely re-affirms her decision not to drive home. She steps carefully into the foyer where she dumped her purse hours earlier, and types a message.  
“Hi mum! We’ve had some wine and Alma thinks it would be a good idea if I stay here instead of driving home. Is that ok? I’ll make sure I have your car back first thing tomorrow.” Moments later, Jane responds.  
“Not a problem honey - just glad 2 hear u r safe. Love, your mum”. Tessa smiles to herself at her mum’s cute formal/informal texting style.  
“Thanks so much mum! Love you :)” 

As Tessa steps back into the kitchen/family room, she sees that Scott and Joe are tidying.  
“Can I help with the clean up?” asks Tessa eagerly.  
“Oh no dear, the men have that. All that talk of the old days has me itching to look at these photos. And it’s so rare i have a captive audience! Come sit!” 

Alma has produced a small stack of picture albums from somewhere. They settle into the couch together. Tessa loves cozying up beside Alma - she's like a second mother - and looking at ancient photos from the Ilderton Skating Club, regional competitions, nationals, and on and on, is fun.  
Just as Tessa and Alma are laughing over a particularly hilarious shot of little Scott wearing eyeliner and a ruffly lace blouse, he finishes his cleaning and sits down on the other side of Alma. Seeing their amusement, he makes a face.  
“Ughhh this can’t be good”, and peers over his mom’s shoulder, seeing what they’re looking at.  
“Ooh, yeah. Perfect. Thanks”. But he's quickly laughing with them. 

They continue to flip through the album, Alma does most of the talking and Tessa relaxes even further into the couch. Before long, she’s yawning.  
“Oh Scott, Tessa’s getting tired. Please go down and make sure your room is habitable for humans.”  
“Ma, c’mon, i’ve been keeping my room clean for like 12 years now,” he says with feigned annoyance, but stands up to do as his mother suggests.  
“Try to keep those eyes open for a few more minutes, T,” he says over his shoulder as he heads for the stairs. She smiles after him.

Alma turns a few more pages in the album, and hears Tessa stifle yet another yawn. She turns to Tessa.  
“I’m sure he’s ready for you down there. Why don’t you head down,” Again, Tessa pauses momentarily at Alma’s wording - _ready for me?!_. But she composes herself, smiles, and gives Alma’s wrist a little squeeze.  
“Thank you so much again for such a fun night and for putting me up.” 

As Tessa walks by on her way downstairs, she says softly, “Good night, Joe” to Scott’s dad, who has dozed off in the recliner across from the TV. His eyes flutter open at the sound of her voice.  
“Ah, night night, kiddo” he says.


	6. Chapter 6

##  December 2016 

###  Scott 

###  In the lower level of the house, Scott moves around his childhood bedroom like a ping pong ball. He’s not cleaning, exactly - the room isn’t actually dirty. He's fussing. The bed is made, but he re-makes it. He crams the few pieces of clothing down in the hamper, shuffles stuff on the desk, checks the bedside table drawer for anything unduly embarrassing. 

Before he knows it, Tessa is in the doorway, smiling.  
“Can I come in?” she asks.  
“Yeah- yes!” he blurts. He reaches up and runs a hand through his hair.  
_Breathe!_ His heart is pounding.

Since his epiphany about Tessa at NHK, he’s certainly felt differently about her, but hasn’t really been nervous _per se_. Awkward? Over eager? Lovesick? Oh yeah. But between their 20ish year partnership, and spending 6-10 hours per day together for much of that time, nervousness hasn't really been a thing. Until now.  
Now, she’s here, at his parents’ house, in his old room, about to climb into his bed... And on top of that, this is the first chance they’ve had to be alone all day. This is weird new territory, even in their already hyper-unusual relationship, and he's shook.

“Wow - I sure haven’t been in here in a long time!” marvels Tessa, looking around.  
“Yeah, hey? Well, ha, this is where the magic happens!” Scott holds his palms out for effect, but almost immediately winces at how stupid that sounded. He’s not generally bringing a lot of dates back to his parents’ basement.  
Tessa raises her eyebrows and gives a surprised laugh. She moves to his desk and examines the vast array of memorabilia - almost all sports-related. He watches her closely, unable to think of anything to say.  
_C’mon Scott!_ he thinks to himself. But his mind is blank.  
Tessa glances back over her shoulder at him.  
“Still a big Medway Cowboys fan, eh?” she says, holding up a mousepad with his high school's logo on it.  
“Yee haw!” he replies quickly. “Now, if only I still actually needed a mouse pad...” and she laughs.  
_Ok, getting better_ , he thinks.

Tessa turns around to face him and suddenly looks a little shy.  
“Um, Scott, do you have something I could… sleep in?”  
“Oh! For sure! I should have thought of that,” and he dashes to a drawer and grabs a T-shirt, then opens another and finds a pair of shorts.  
“Pretty sure these are the smallest shorts I have here,” he offers. Tessa looks slightly surprised and reaches for the clothes.  
“Oh! Ha - smallest like, that will fit you better, not like short shorts! I wouldn’t uh.. give you short shorts. Even if I had any. Which I don’t. So…”   
Tessa mouths 'ohhh' and chuckles, then confirms where the basement bathroom is so she can get ready for bed. 

Waiting for her to return, Scott stands motionless in the middle of the room. His mind races over the day: it was her idea to come over, she’s stayed for hours, and didn’t try to find a way to get home instead of sleeping over... It hits him that everything's adding up pretty positively, much better than he could have hoped for. His inner pep talk gives him a little rush of excitement.

But then he remembers she’s going to be back any second, and the nerves return. From the corner of his eye, he sees that the top of one of the window blinds is slightly askew. It’s probably been that way for years, but nevertheless, he climbs up on the desk and tries to straighten the bent slats. His neck is crooked at an angle, as there isn’t quite enough room to stand up straight.

“Hey,” says Tessa with a note of amusement in her voice, coming into the room and closing the door behind her. Startled, Scott moves to stand and bangs his head against the ceiling tile directly above him.  
“Gah!” he exclaims, even though the ceiling tile moves with him and it doesn’t hurt at all.  
“Oh dear!” Tessa laughs sympathetically. “Are you ok?”  
“Oh, yeah, yeah,” he says bashfully with a hand to the back of his head, hopping down. “Just doing some light home repairs. You know, pretty manly stuff”.  
“Right,” says Tessa, giving him her classic ‘Oh Scott’ look. She's practically swimming in the clothes he lent her.  
_Pretty cute_.

He swallows and takes a deep breath, and he finally regains some sense of control over himself. He slowly takes a few steps toward her.  
Now she seems nervous. She is speaking quickly, animatedly, as he comes closer.

“Hey, did you see what T-shirt you gave me?” she looks down at herself. “Ilderton Carnival 1998 - remember that one? This is a collector’s item!”  
Scott smirks and reaches down and with both hands, pinching the hem of the T-shirt between his fingers, and pulling so it tents away from her body. He makes a point of examining the faded logo.  
“We did a really good program that year, I think,” she continues a mile a minute. "Wasn't it ... uh, oh... Jeez I probably just saw a photo upstairs and now I can't remember--" and then looks up into his face and stops talking. They stare at each other.  
“Scott,” she breathes.

He moves his hands to her waist. He forces himself to be sincere, even though joking would be easier.  
“You have no idea how happy I am you came over, Tess” he begins.  
“I really wanted to, uh..I was worried... you didn’t know much I love the bracelet. I don’t think I even thanked you,” she stammers at first, then seems more sure of what she’s saying.  
“So you like it?” he teases her very gently, opening his eyes wide and peering down at her.  
Holding his gaze, she says earnestly, “It’s the absolute best gift I’ve ever gotten.”

They have moved even closer to each other, and their bodies are touching.  
His hands are still on her waist and his thumbs are under her shirt, rubbing the smooth skin of her back just above the elastic band of the shorts he gave her to wear. She brings her hands to rest on his arms.  
_This is it_ , he thinks without really thinking at all. He dips his head, and kisses her.  
She kisses him back with surprising intensity, and responding, he moves his hands up her bare back under her shirt, pressing her into him.  
Hours, weeks, months, years, of tension, longing, admiration, and love come to a head in a single moment. His whole body screams ecstatically, rejoicing in the feeling. 

... 

Seconds - or is it minutes? - later, there is scratching at the door, and they blow apart from each other like shrapnel. Little yipping sounds come through the door.  
“The puppies,” says Scott blankly, adjusting the waistband of his sweat pants and giving his head a shake, grappling to regain his faculties.  
“The puppies?” asks Tessa, confused and visibly trying to catch her breath. The door swings open and Quinn and Shea are just outside, on their knees and each lifting a hand as if it were a paw.  
“Woof!” they say.  
“Oh! The puppies!” says Tessa, understanding somewhat now but still clearly reeling. The kids crawl into the room toward them.  
“What are you doing up? It’s too late for puppies!” exclaims Scott, finding his bearings somewhat in uncle mode.  
“Woof woof!” says Quinn.  
“Woof!” says Shea, her echo.  
“Alright, back to bed for puppies,” says Scott, ushering them out of the room gently with his foot. At the doorway, he turns and grabs the door handle and looks back at Tessa, who is smiling but wide-eyed, holding her cheeks in her hands.  
“Night,” he says, and then more quietly “to be continued,” with a raise of his brow.  
Tessa makes a funny little laugh-sigh-eek sound, and then almost whispers, “Night”. 

Once the kids are back in bed, Scott lies splayed like a starfish across the lumpy old hide-a-bed. He stares at the ceiling of his parents’ den, much as he did in his hotel room at NHK after the banquet. But instead of feeling confused and anxious as he had then, he now feels ecstatically happy. He easily pushes any questions or doubts out of mind.  
_That kiss_ , he thinks, reliving it over, and over, and over... _God damn_. 

In the morning, the kids are up early and come tumbling in to climb on Scott on the hide-a-bed.  
“Time to play!” demands Quinn. Scott's eyes creak open, and within the moment, he remembers that Tessa's here, they kissed, and it was insaaaaaane.  
“Alrighty then!” he says, jumping out of bed. The kids are happily surprised to get an enthusiastic response from an adult at this hour, and look around excitedly for what they should do with him now that they have him.  
They head upstairs, and Alma and Joe are already puttering around the kitchen.  
“Is Tessa still sleeping?” asks Alma as they come into the room. Scott strolls toward her, wraps his arm around her shoulder, and plants a kiss on her hair.  
“Morning, ma.”  
“Aww, yes, good morning, honey. So?”  
“If I had to bet, it's 7:15 a.m. and I would say Tessa Virtue is sleeping, yes.” He feels a little boost even in saying her name.  
“Ok - well kids, let’s try to keep it a little quiet so we don’t wake Tessa,” Alma warns.  
“How about some ‘toons?” asks Scott, walking toward the TV, thinking he’ll take a shower if Quinn and Shea are occupied. He finds Paw Patrol on the TV and they are instantly riveted. 

When Scott returns, the kids are still watching the TV, and his mom is well into the pancake making process. His dad is setting syrup and butter on the table.  
“Pancakes!” exclaims Scott, and the kids whip around to look at him. “Tessa won’t want to miss this, should we go get her up?”  
“Yes!!” cry the kids, ready for some excitement.  
“Are you sure you should wake her?” asks Alma, with a sidelong glance at Scott.  
“Oh yeah,” says Scott confidently, as they head for his room. He's sure. 

Scott leads the kids in creeping down the hall to his room and makes a show of pressing his ear against the door. They watch him intently.  
Silence on the other side. Looking down at them and placing a finger to his lips, he shoulders open the door. Notwithstanding his direction to stay quiet, the kids start squealing and run toward the bed.  
Scott laughs and joins in, yelling “ahhhhhhhh!” in a funny voice and coming right behind them. 

Tessa is sleeping on her side facing them, and he sees her eyes flutter open and she is instantly beaming at them.  
_Sleeping beauty_ , he thinks.  


Scott effortlessly hops over Tessa onto the bed, so that he is between her and the wall, and turns to face the same direction she is facing, lying on his side. He inches up behind her, propping his head up on one hand so he can see the kids over her, and casually resting his other hand on the lump under the covers that must be her hip. 

The kids have made their way up on the bed, too, peering into Tessa’s face.  
“Good morning!!” they yell. Tessa laughs and rubs her eyes.  
“Wow! What a wake up!” she says sleepily but happily. She shifts to turn onto her back, and Scott’s hand now rests on what is her stomach beneath the blanket. She asks the kids how they slept and Quinn tells her what Paw Patrol is. 

Scott is barely paying attention. He has a great view now that she is lying back, and he is gazing intently at her face, and making tiny movements with the fingers of his hand that rests on her body.  
Her eyes shift from the kids to Scott’s face, and she grins at him. His heart rate quickens.  
“Grandma’s makin’ pancakes!” announces Quinn, and Tessa’s attention turns back to the kids.  
“Oh, excellent!” she says. “Well maybe I ought to get up and get dressed, then. I can't miss pancakes.”  
“Ok kids, let’s give the lady some privacy,” says Scott, carefully crawling back over her with a parting squeeze of her leg beneath the covers, and leading the kids out of the room. 

Many pancakes later, Tessa rises from the table, thanks Alma and Joe profusely for hosting her, and noting she needs to get her mom’s car back.  
“It was our pleasure! You are always, always welcome,” says Alma warmly.  
“Goodbye, Quinn and Shea! Thank you for having me!” says Tessa cheerily to the kids. Quinn, her mouth full of pancake, furrows her brow.  
“Um, we don’t live here,” and the grown-ups all laugh. Tessa heads toward the door, with Scott trailing closely behind.  
“I’ll walk you to the car,” says Scott under his breath and he can see that she’s smiling as she stoops to put her boots on. He helps her on with her coat, and squeezes her shoulders gently as she reaches for the door handle. 

They reach Jane’s car, and stand facing each other for a moment in the cold without speaking. Scott’s mind races with things he’d like to say.  
“Well, this was fun!” he manages, with a giant goofy grin. Tessa giggles, blushing again.  
“Definitely!” she says, and looks up at him biting her lip. Scott needs to use every last iota of self-control he has not to kiss her again. But they both know full well there must be at least one set of inquiring eyes watching them from the house.

“You’re sure you’ve got to go to Toronto for New Years?” Scott asks, wincing in the sun, and cocking his head.  
“I’m sure,” she says with a smile and a definitive little nod. “I’m leaving this evening, but i’ll be back in Montreal on the 2nd. See you then?” she asks hopefully.  
“Uh, yeahhhhhh,” he says with a playful ‘duh’ tone, pulling her in as close as he can in a hug. She squeezes him back and he tries to drink in the feeling of having her pressed into him. He quickly nuzzles his face in her neck, and leaves a tiny kiss there.

Pulling back, he says, “Ok, well have fun. But don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,” with a meaningful look and holding her at arm’s length by the shoulders. She smiles.  
“See you next year!” she jokes with a big cheesy wink. _Classic late-December Virtch line_ , he muses as watches her drive off down the long driveway. _A year sounds about right_.


	7. Chapter 7

##  December 2016/ January 2017 

###  Tessa 

###  That night, Tessa takes the train to Toronto. By the time she settles into her seat, she’s exhausted. After arriving back home from the Moirs’ that morning, the day had quickly gotten away from her - visiting, errands, packing. No breaks. No time to think. 

But now on the train, she has two and half hours to herself. She puts headphones in her ears - the international sign for “don’t talk to me”. She pulls a novel from her big leather bag, but just lays it in her lap and looks out the window. The sky is dark, she can see herself in the glass.

_Less than 24 hours ago, you were kissing Scott in his parents’ basement_ , she thinks to her semi-transparent reflection.  
For the first time since it happened, she really lets herself relive those few moments, think them over in detail. She closes her eyes and watches him come slowly toward her, feels him slip his hands inside the back of the old T-shirt he gave her to wear.  
Pull her into him.  
Kiss her, so perfectly.  
Her whole body rushes with the memory, and she squirms in her seat. 

But as she plays it over and over, the memory erodes a little.  
_Did he kiss me? Or maybe I kissed him but I convinced myself he kissed me_.  
_I invited myself over there. Maybe he was just being polite_.  
_What was the bracelet anyway? He’s generous. He’s nostalgic. It doesn’t actually mean anything_.  
_He probably just wants to be friends._

Tessa gives her head a shake and sits up straighter in her chair. She is prone to self-doubt - she knows this. She can literally, objectively be the best in the world at something, and still question everything about herself. And it’s always so much worse when she’s tired.

_What does the evidence show? _, she hears her lawyer dad’s voice in her head, the voice of reason. She forces herself to account for all of the facts. She knows instinctively there’s no _way___ Scott wasn’t into that kiss.  
_And he said to be continued_.  
_And he practically spooned me this morning_.  
_And he said it was fun_.  
She feels relieved, and relaxes a little. She still doesn’t totally know what’s going on, but she feels somewhat better. 

__

She’s got to shake this off for a while. Mercifully, after years being subjected to sports psychologists, she has tools she can avail herself of when crazy thinking plagues her.  
_Take a deep breath. Distract yourself. Get some perspective. Compartmentalize._  
She cracks her book, and although she doesn’t retain much of what she reads, it helps. As the train pulls into the station, she feels excited. New Years weekend in Toronto. She’s been looking forward to this for weeks. 

... 

Toronto is just the distraction she needs. Friends, eating, shopping, parties. When Scott pops into her brain (which, inevitably, is often), she makes an effort to gently push him away. Apart from the excitement of that kiss, it also doesn’t take it long to hit her that there is a whole huge can of worms she’s barely had time to consider. This isn’t just about liking a boy, and trying to figure out if he likes her. This is Scott. This is their career. This is her best friend, and her business partner. This is scary.

She manages, with considerable effort, to convince herself that this is not the time to sort this all out - she needs to just enjoy herself. It actually helps that, as far as Tessa is concerned, Scott is generally not much one for texting, and based on the habits they have developed over years and years of knowing each other, she doesn’t actually expect to hear from him. Without really realizing it, it’s a blessing for Tessa not to fight a war with her phone, willing it to produce something from him. She just assumes they’ll reconnect in Montreal.  
_And play that as it comes_ , she thinks with a mix of excitement and anxiety. 

But then on Friday, she checks her phone early in the evening, and sees a message from Scott. Her heart stalls for a moment when his name flashes on the screen.  
“So what hip TO club are you girls hitting ce soir?”

She must admit, although this wouldn’t always be the case if a guy were keeping tabs on her, she is thrilled that he’s wondering what she’s up to.  
She grins to herself, then sends him a pic her friend Ana took a few minutes earlier, of Tessa in her new sweatshirt - a Christmas gift from Jordan - with STARTED WEARING MORE AND GOING OUT LESS in block letters across the chest. Her eyes are closed in the photo, but she can admit, at least to herself - she looks cute.  
She quickly follows it up with a message.

“We’re doing no such thing! Staying in to watch movies instead. Resting up for NYE tomorrow! :)”  
Scott responds moments later with the heart eyes emoji, and then follows up with, “Drizzzzzzay! Me likey”.

Tessa stares at her phone in disbelief. Getting messages like this from Scott is akin to being in the Twilight Zone. There’s no doubt about it, it’s weird. But there’s also no doubt that she’s not complaining.

“Why Mr Moir, I didn’t know you were familiar with the emoji keyboard ;)”  
“I’m not, that was an actual pic of my face when I saw you”.  
Tessa’s feels her jaw physically drop open. _Is swooning still a thing?_ Before she can respond, Scott sends another.  
“Yikes I hope that wasn’t to desperate haha! Sure is nice to see you tho. Heading out to play some shinny with the buds, you girls have fun.”  
Tessa feels a thrill run through her. She doesn’t even mind that he used the wrong ‘to’.  
Getting her bearings, she responds, “Haha! Not at all, I loved it :) You have fun too! Xo”.

“Jesus, Tess, who are you texting with? You look like you’re having a major Disney princess moment over there,” Tessa looks up with a start and sees that Ana is watching her intently.  
“Oh god, no, no body,” says Tessa, trying to sound as nonchalant as possible. “Just some guy I know in Montreal. Not even really a thing.”  
“Mmm Hmmmm” says Ana skeptically, but knowing Tessa well enough that if she doesn’t want to talk about it, she won’t. Ana is young, but she’s not dumb. 

The next night, Tessa and Ana dress up and head to a New Year’s eve party. The crowd is very Toronto, almost painfully fashionable. Tessa loves it.  
But even though she has a great time, her mind does drift to Scott. She feels a little pang of regret realizing she never even asked him what he’s up to for New Year’s. She turns over the various possibilities in her mind, starting with picturing him at home alone at his parents’ watching TV and wistfully thinking of her, which makes her feel sorry for him but also, of course, flatters her. 

But she quickly realizes how improbable it is that he wouldn’t have things to do on New Year’s, especially seeing as he’s in Ilderton, surrounded by his dozens of friends and cousins. Her thoughts flip quickly to picturing him at a party - a bonfire? A hot tub?! - drinking beers, talking to girls.... Tessa feels her stomach drop as she is overcome with an uncomfortable, jealous feeling.

_What am I jealous about? I don’t even know what he’s up to. Why don’t I just ask him. He asked me._  
But looking at her phone, she hesitates. What if he’s having such an amazing time he doesn’t answer. That will ruin her night for sure.  
Plus, she should be able to have a good time at this amazing party, without spending the whole thing fretting about Scott. She determines that the best thing is to put it aside and have a fabulous time. 

She has another drink and mostly succeeds, but when midnight comes around, she allows self pity to creep in, and calls a spade a spade - she wishes she was with Scott.  
She slips away and finds an empty bedroom. She’d rather avoid an awkward kiss with a stranger, but doesn’t want to thrid wheel Ana and her model boyfriend. 

As she hears the clamour of the countdown happening a few rooms away, she gazes out the window, sees a couple pause as they walk down the street to share a new year’s kiss.  
A little ache tightens her chest. She sighs, turns to sit on the bed and pulls her phone from her clutch. 

Her breath catches when she sees a message from Scott.  
He texted right at 12:00, sending a kissy face emoji, and a message.  
“Happy 2017! Hope I’m the first to give you a kiss in the new year”  
She clasps her phone to her chest, and closes her eyes. She almost feels like crying. It’s so sweet and she feels so relieved he’s thinking of her, too.  
“You sure are :) Can’t wait to see you soon” She signs off with three kissy face emojis of her own. Bold by her usual reserved standards, but she's in the mood to throw caution to the wind. Scott responds right away.  
“Oh Virtch. Back atcha. Big time” 

... 

A few days later, Tessa flies back to Montreal. Her Uber drops her at her place, and she carries her bags inside and flips on the lights. Home, and Toronto, were great, but she loves her Montreal apartment and is delighted to be back. Having inherited her mother’s taste, almost everything is white or cream, classic and cozy. 

She feels herself relax as she puts the kettle on for tea, and lugs her bags to her room. When she settles in on the couch with her steaming mug, she picks up her phone. She feels a little jab of disappointment not to have a message from Scott, but she opens Instagram and starts scrolling through her feed. She’s not really focusing, though, and thinks to herself, _Go on and text him. It’s your turn._  
She’s not one for games or ‘rules’, and any of that seems especially stupid when it comes to Scott. But it’s just true that he has initiated all of the contact they’ve had over the last few days.

Tentatively, she closes Instagram and opens a new message to Scott. As soon as she types his name into the ‘to’ line, their thread of messages from the last few days appear. She feels a rush looking at them again, even though she’s thought about them so many times in as many days - she’s hardly forgotten. Those texts have gone a decent way to allaying some of her doubts, and seeing them again bolsters her confidence.

“Hello! :) Are you back yet?”  
A few minutes go by and no response. She frowns a little, but again counsels herself, _calm down, he’s probably either in the air or tied up with something. You have no reason to think he won’t respond._

Then, a message comes in, but it’s not Scott. It’s Eric. Tessa tries not to feel disappointed.  
“Hi Tessa! Happy new year! Are you back in MTL? Up to anything tonight? Luis is stressing me out and I could use a giant glass of vino!!”  
Tessa smiles at her phone. She knows Eric and his partner are madly in love, but they do have a way of pushing each other’s buttons, and it’s not unusual for Eric to want to vent.  
_He probably needs to tell someone that the way Luis loads the dishwasher is making him crazy _, Tessa smiles to herself. And truth be told, even when Eric is in a mood, he’s always great company. It’ll do her no good to sit and stare at her phone all night.__

“I am here! And it would be great to see you. Why don’t you come over! I’m home so come anytime.”  
“Yay! I’ll stop by the Dep on my way. See you soon!”  
“:)”

Tessa leaves her phone on the couch and goes to the kitchen to get out her nice wine glasses, and to see if she has any little nibbles she can serve to Eric to accompany their wine.  
Then she heads to her room to start sorting through her laundry. After a few minutes, she realizes she should probably keep her phone nearby in case Eric is faster than she expects him to be. She goes into the living room to get it, and when she turns it over, there’s a message from Scott.

“Just got in can I come over?”  
Her heart is pounding in her chest. Without thinking, she texts back.  
“Of course! :)”  
“Ya!!!” And then,  
“See you in 5ish”

Her mind is racing. _He’s coming over. He’s coming over. He’ll be here in 5._  
She looks down at her ratty (by Tessa standards) sweatshirt and yoga pants. She lifts her arm and sniffs. Without another moment’s hesitation, she turns on her heel and practically sprints to the bathroom, where she makes world record time freshening up, and then zips into her room where she quickly pulls on fresh undies, skinny jeans, and a cashmere sweater, and kicks her previous outfit into the closet. 

__

She hears a knock at the door and hurries to get it. When she opens the door, Scott is there. His cheeks are rosy from walking over in the chilly air and he looks so genuinely happy to see her. She feels her insides melt at the sight of him.  
“Hi!” her voice is breathy and her heart is racing. She steps out of the way to let him in and closes the door behind him.  
They stand staring at each other for a long moment.

“Hi,” says Scott. He still has his jacket on, but steps toward her and takes her in his arms. They move at the same time to kiss each other, and as their mouths meet, Tessa feels a surge through her body.  
_Even better than I remembered._ She flicks his lips lightly with her tongue, and his mouth opens. His hands move over her body, gripping her ass and running up and down the sides of her soft sweater.  
He pulls her even closer to him, and he’s hard. She makes a sound she barely recognizes.  
She hasn’t felt this way, maybe ever in her whole life. 

Inevitably, Tessa’s phone starts buzzing on the coffee table. The realization hits her, she pulls out of the kiss, turning her head and looking down at her phone.  
Scott closes his eyes and presses his forehead against her.  
“That can’t possibly be the puppies,” he says in desperation.  
Tessa laughs but then contorts her face with regret.  
“No - it’s Eric. He’s here. I was so excited to see you, I forgot he was coming over.”

Scott throws his head back and squeezes his eyes shut again.  
“Bah! Radford!” he says, groaning with some mix of mock and actual consternation. He still has his arms wrapped firmly around Tessa.  
“I’m sorry” she says, frowning. “Rain check?”  
He opens his eyes and stares at her like a man on the brink of insanity. She laughs at his expression and he bends his head to kiss her on the mouth one more time before releasing her from his grasp.  
“Raincheck, yes. If there is a God!” he says dramatically.

She laughs again as she steps away, toward the door, and gives him a quick look as if to say, “please behave,” even though she isn’t sure she has anything to worry about.  
But Eric may find it odd that Scott is here, and she doesn’t want him to think anything.  
Scott runs his hands through his hair and Tessa straightens her sweater.  
She swings open the door and yells down to the street level.

“Hey Eric! It’s this one.”  
Eric sees her and waves, jogging up the external stairs with a brown paper bag from the depanneur in hand.  
“Salut mademoiselle!” says Eric, reaching the door. He kisses her lightly on both cheeks. It’s only then that he notices Scott.  
“Mr. Moir! This is a pleasant surprise!” he shoots a quick look back over his shoulder at Tessa as he moves in to hug Scott.  
“Yeah!” Tessa answers quickly, “he was just dropping off my” - she sees her phone, still on the coffee table - “phone charger! Yeah I forgot my phone charger in London when I left for Toronto”. She rolls her eyes and shakes her head as if to say, ‘boy, am I an idiot’.

But Eric doesn’t seem very curious. He nods a little looking at Scott, and launches into asking him about his holiday.  
“It was pretty awesome,” says Scott, making a face for emphasis and shooting a quick look at Tessa. She feels her face redden a little.  
“Well, that’s always nice to hear,” responds Eric. “Are you going to join us for a glass of wine?” Eric eagerly holds up the paper bag.  
“Oh no, no, I wouldn’t want to intrude. And besides, I think I better go take care of something,” shooting another look, this one very pointed, in Tessa’s direction. This makes her blush even more, so she pretends to cough.  
Her instinct was right - she’s got to get him out of here.

“Well, ok then, Scott - thanks so much for dropping that off! See you bright and early tomorrow” she puts her hand on the door handle.  
“Boy,” jokes Scott to Eric as he heads for the door, “you do the girl a favour and you get the bum’s rush!” Tessa rolls her eyes, and this time it’s closer to genuine. She holds the door open for Scott, and Eric turns to move into the kitchen in search of a cork screw.  
“Bye, Scott!” he calls over his shoulder.  
“Later, Radford!” says Scott cheerily as he marches toward the door.

“Tessa,” he says formally with a nod of the head as he passes her on the way out.  
“Bye,” she says almost inaudibly as he steps lightly down the stairs and off into the evening.


	8. Chapter 8

##  January 2017 

###  Scott 

###  Scott wakes the next morning to his alarm at 5:30 am. Getting back to the grind after a break is always tough, but he feels ready. And he gets to see Tessa. At 5:45, he texts her.  
“Mornin! Pick you up in 10?”  
“Oh thanks! But it’s Tuesday -I need my own car so I can get to barre after.”  
“Oh right. Holidaze - i forgot what day it is. See you there.” 

At the rink, everyone is chatting happily about their holidays in the change room. When Scott comes in, his eyes instantly meet Tessa’s and he sees hers flash. He wants to go to her, but he stops himself short. Even though so much has happened between them since they were last here, no one else knows. Nothing else has changed. He could tell the night before that Tessa was not ready for Eric to know anything, so it seems pretty safe to say she’d be feeling the same way about everyone else at the rink. Everyone else, period. 

She is a remarkably private person. He’s been one of the closest people in her life for close to 20 years, and he doesn’t really know all that much detail about her past relationships. He’s confident he knows which were the significant ones, generally knew roughly when they started and stopped. On rare - actually very rare - occasions when they were younger, she would seek his advice or cry on his shoulder. But that hasn’t happened in ages. Best bet is to keep this as much on the down low as possible, unless he is told he should do otherwise by her.  
_Right, back to normal_ , he thinks to himself. He takes a seat beside Zach and talks with him as he pulls his skates out, doing his best not to look over at Tessa too much. 

On the ice, he takes a few warm up laps on his own, trying to get his feet back under him. It feels good to be back to work and back in the routine. When he’s done his own warm-up, he skates over to Tessa and takes her hand for their customary together warm-up laps. He's pleasantly surprised when she gives his hand a squeeze and shoots him a little smile, so he squeezes back, and intertwines his fingers with hers for a moment before moving into dance hold. 

From there, they’re back in the zone - their usual focus and intensity. Again, it feels good. They work on their short. There are a few moments during the practice, when the choreography requires Tessa to stamp her foot and whip her ponytail around in his face, or when it has him stand behind her and grab her hips with both hands, that his mind strays a little. But for the most part, he manages pretty well. Really, he got pretty good practice over the last few months turning off his feelings for Tessa while they worked, and even though it’s harder now that things between them have progressed, he knows he more or less has a handle on it. Plus, he had to do this as a teenage male, and that was plenty of practice at suppressing urges. 

Marie really pushes them. They come back after a particularly challenging run through, breathing hard.  
“Ah no! Santa Claus made you soft!” Marie cries. Tessa and Scott look at each other and then back at Marie and burst out laughing. But she’s not wrong - they’ve got some catching up to do, and the reality is, this isn’t a great time to be distracted. Scott starts thinking as he takes a few cool down laps. Gabi and Guillaume whiz by, looking razor sharp. Zach and Madi aren’t far off, either.  
_Shit_ , thinks Scott. The stark reality is, they can’t afford unnecessary distractions. They’ve got to figure out what’s happening between them, so they can manage it. It’s not romantic, but it’s true. 

When practice wraps up, Tessa hurries back to the change room to make sure she’s not late for her barre class near Beaconsfield. Scott follows behind and sits beside her while she takes her skates off, and starts to do the same, albeit more slowly.  
“Feels great to be back!” she says to him with a big smile, which he returns.  
“Sure does,” he says agreeably.  
“I know we’re a little rusty, but I thought we really hit our elements today,” Tessa continues. Scott nods, barely paying attention. As Tessa stands up to go and slings her bag over over her shoulder, he looks up at her from the bench and lowers his voice.  
"Any plans tonight? Can I call in my rain check?” In typical (adorable, he thinks) Tessa fashion, her face flushes red and she shakes her head yes.  
“Yeah, tonight would be great.” she smiles down at him.  
“Let’s make it dinner - i’ll pick up some food. Maybe Thai? Or sushi?” She looks a little surprised and starts to walk away backward.  
“Dinner would be great! You pick. I’ll see you then.” And she’s gone. 

Scott heads to the gym for his own workout, and really pushes himself. It helps clear his head. What’s he going to say to Tessa tonight?  
_I love you?_  
_I like you?_  
_I want to fuck you?_  
He reflects that all of the above are definitely true, but he wants to find a balance between overwhelming her emotionally, and leaving her with the impression that all he’s after is sex. He knows her well enough to know how sensitive she is. He’s got to tread carefully, or he could seriously hurt her, freak her out, fuck up this last part of their career… The road ahead is treacherous. But there’s no going back, and he definitely doesn’t want that, either.

Turning it over in his mind further, he thinks- _definitely the I like you part. Hopefully the I want to fuck you part. Almost for sure not the I love you part. At least not unless she says it._ He knows that last part is wishful thinking, but he’s confident by nature.  
He’s got the semblance of a plan. He can do this. He pushes harder into his workout.


	9. Chapter 9

##  January 2017 

###  Tessa 

###  At 5:30, Tessa’s phone lights up with a text from Scott.  
“Work for you if i come by around 615?”  
“Yeah!” she responds.  
She tries not to pace around too much waiting for him, but she can’t deny that she’s nervous. It looks like this will be their first uninterrupted chunk of time together since all of this started... happening. She’s half expecting Scott to walk in, pick her up, and carry her straight to the bedroom, at least based on the last few times they’ve been alone together for even two minutes. That possibility does make her nervous, but in a good way. 

But then, he seemed quite serious earlier in the day. He asked to get together, but no winks, no eyebrows. And then, she remembers he’s bringing food. Presumably, he's intending for them to actually eat it together. Doubts creep in. What if he wants to tell her this was all a weird mistake? She noticed him watching the other teams in practice today, thought he looked concerned. She knows all too well that introducing this new aspect into their partnership is a huge risk. Scott, the ultimate competitor and strategist, is no doubt thinking that, too. She continues to pace around. 

Scott eventually arrives with a bag of sushi containers.  
“Special delivery for the Virtch!” he says when Tessa comes to the door.  
She laughs nervously. He walks in, puts the food down on the counter, and then looks up at her. She has followed him in, but hangs back a little. She has her hands stuffed into the back pockets of her pants and her heart is beating in her throat. By this point she has convinced herself he’s here to put an end to whatever this is.  
Terrified of what he might say, Tessa starts talking before he can.

“So, what did you bring?” her mind darting around, as Scott starts digging into the bag. She doesn’t really hear what he says, but responds “oh good!” maybe a little too eagerly.  
“What do you feel like drinking?” she moves toward the fridge. A little wine or something might take the edge off.  
“Just water for me,” he says rubbing his ‘gut’, and pulling his T-shirt up a little in the process. “Too much good stuff over the holiday and that training kicked my butt today.” She absently watches him pat his rock solid stomach, but then she gives a quick a nod of approval.  
“Oh yeah, totally. I’ll join you,” but distracted, she fills only one glass with water and puts it down in front of him where he's taken a seat at the table. She slips into a seat across from him.

“How was barre?” he asks her, popping a piece of sushi in his mouth.  
“It was good! I mean, it’s hard, you know. I was pretty, uh, stiff I guess, after the break, but it felt good to be back. I mean as good as ballet can really feel, ha, uh... How was the gym?” She feels she can hear her own voice ringing in her ears, it’s so high.  
“It was really good, actually. You know, some good cardio really clears my mind,” he pauses for a moment and swallows. Tessa senses him shifting from casual chit chat to something more substantial, and she can’t help it - she thinks she may faint.  
She stares at him, unblinking. Awaiting her fate.

“I - ah, a lot has happened in the last few weeks,” he starts, clearly trying to choose his words carefully. Tessa feels her breathing slow.  
“I feel like I should tell you, though-" Her heart thuds in her chest.  
"that I’ve been having feelings - uh, romantic, i guess, uh, feelings, for you, for a while, like a little longer than that…” he trails off.  
She blinks.  
“Yeah, I uhh.. I mean I guess, you know, at least I think, there’s been something between us for a long, long time - like years? Uh, decades?” he raises a brow at this and smiles apprehensively. She is listening so carefully that she doesn’t really react. She just waits for him to continue. He hurries on.  
"And uh, but, I mean, I guess when we were at NHK this year, I just, uhh.. It was like a light switch turned on, and I suddenly realized that I was feeling these, um, feelings? For you?”

She looks down at her plate, processing. _NHK. Feelings. Something. Between. Us._  
She’s reeling but at least starting to grasp that this is not an 'it’s not you, it’s me' conversation. Suddenly sensing that he is holding his breath waiting for her reaction, she makes herself look up. She says the first thing that comes to her.  
“I’m sorry, Scott. I didn’t know.”  
“Oh, god no, no don’t be sorry - you didn’t do anything wrong at all” he scrambles to reassure her. “I just really had no idea how to tell you, or if I should tell you.” She still looks worried.  
“I mean, I guess I wasn’t too jazzed when you went out with Guillaume’s ‘straight, hot’ or whatever friend” - here, Scott mimics Tessa mimicking Guillaume, and Tessa smiles a bit.  
“But then, I mean, thank god - the man purse really saved the day,” he deadpans, and this, finally, makes her really laugh and he laughs too, relieved.  
“But yeah, uh, I just, after a while, I really needed to do something, so, uh… the bracelet” - they both glance at Tessa’s wrist, resting on the table. She feels serious again.  
“And uh, you know, I figured, even if you didn’t feel the same way about me, at least I could give you that and it could be more a keepsake of this year or, something… But then, you, uhhh, when you came to visit at my parents, I...”  
Now he pauses, swallows, presses on.  
“I guess, I mean… Tessa, that was one of the best days I’ve ever had.” He stops, and looks her in the eye.  
She starts nodding slowly, holding his gaze for a long moment.  
“Me too,” she says very quietly. “That was one of my best days, too.”

At this, he bursts into a smile, and she grins back. This continues for another long moment, and then Scott breaks the silence.  
“Man, anyone who could see this whole scene would think it was pretty nauseating, hey?”  
Tessa throws her head back and laughs, but then scrunches up her face playfully and shakes her head.  
“I don’t care about them”.  
With that, she gets up and walks slowly around the table, and lowers herself onto Scott’s lap. She loves the look on his face as he watches her. She folds her hands behind his neck, and gradually lowers her mouth to his. This is different than their last few kisses, much slower and more deliberate.

Tessa pulls her mouth away from his for a moment, breathing heavily into his ear. As he looks up, searching for her again, she swings her leg around so that she is straddling him. She presses her weight down into his lap, and he tosses his head back and gasps for air.  
“Oh fuck,” he breathes.  
She kisses him again.  
_Oh fuck is right,_ she thinks.


	10. Chapter 10

##  January 2017 

###  Scott 

###  Tessa is straddling Scott, kissing him and grabbing his hair in her hands, and he thinks he’s going to lose his mind.  
_If this keeps going, I’m going to have a_ really _hard time stopping_ , he thinks with what feels like his last functioning brain cell. 

With the thought that maybe a change of position will help him regain some control over himself, he stands, lifting Tessa with him, and sets her down on the counter. He pulls back to look at her, but she grins at him and dives back in. Now instead of bearing all of her weight downward on his crotch, she scoots in and squeezes her thighs around his hips.  
_Different, but - God - still pretty damn good_ , he thinks, blissfully for a moment, but then again worrying he’ll end up pushing her further than she wants to go. He pulls back again.

“Maybe I should go home,” he forces himself to say.  
Tessa looks momentarily surprised, then pouts for a split second, then presses her lips together in a resigned smile and nods.  
Seeing even the smallest expression of disappointment on her face, he immediately rethinks himself. He sucks air through his teeth.  
“Or maybe I shouldn’t…?” turning his head a little, and raising his eyebrows at her.  
_You tell me_ , he thinks desperately.

Tessa gives a little ‘huh’ laugh, and looks down at the floor. She finally looks back up into his face with her brow slightly furrowed, clearly contemplating the situation. But she doesn’t say anything.

“Ok,” he starts again, “I’m thinking that we’re both, I think, thinking… that we’re going to… do this… at some point?” he tries to appear open to the various possible answers to the question, but knows he probably looks more like he’s got a mousetrap clamped on his balls.   
Being the one to put the brakes on is not his natural inclination, particularly at the moment.

“I would say that’s a fair statement,” responds Tessa with a slow, definitive nod, and - _Jesus_ \- a smile that makes him want to slap himself for shutting this down.  
“Ok. Well. That helps…kinda..” he struggles, now fully grimacing.  
“We can build up to it, I guess? ...Goal setting!” she interjects with a laugh, sarcastically swinging her fist across her chest to demonstrate their trademark Canada’s Sweethearts can-do attitude.

He laughs, too, albeit painfully. They are used to making ‘team’ decisions together, and so at least this comes naturally to them.  
“We do have an early morning tomorrow,” she says reasonably, and reaches out to rest her hands on his shoulders.   
He has his hands tucked under her thighs and gives them a little squeeze.  
“We do.” He sighs.

As she walks him to the door, he stops short and presses his eyes shut.  
“I feel like I’m _really_ going to regret the way I handled this,” he says, making Tessa laugh.  
“I hope you only mean the last few minutes!” she jokes.  
“Oh! Ha. Yeah, sorry - definitely no regrets about the part _before_ I said I should leave,” he says, shaking his head as though deeply disappointed with himself.

“Now, I better just shake your hand, or you may have a problem,” he says dejectedly as he extends his hand to her.  
“Oh, you,” she laughs again, deking around his hand, and planting a quick kiss on his lips.  
“To be continued,” she says with a wink, echoing what he told her the night they first kissed in his room at his parents’.  
_Ugh. That’s cute_ , he thinks, as the door closes behind him.


	11. Chapter 11

##  January 2017 

###  Tessa 

###  In the car from the rink to the gym on Wednesday, their conversation turns to Marina, and Scott launches into his flawless impression of her.  
“Scutt! You. Tryyyy bettahhhh.”  
Tessa belly laughs. Between the accuracy of the impression and the face Scott makes when he does it, there’s almost nothing on earth that could make her laugh harder. 

Scott steals a glance at Tessa laughing as he drives, and smiles to himself.  
“It’s so nice that everything’s still pretty much the same, except, you know, we’re, like, doin’ it and stuff,” he observes happily. He’s hamming it up, but he also looks pretty pleased with himself. Tessa gives a surprised laugh and arches her eyebrows.  
“Did I miss something?”  
“I guess I am getting a little ahead of myself,” he acknowledges, but still beaming.  
Tessa laughs again, shaking her head. She looks out the window for a minute.

“Any plans Friday night?” she asks casually.  
“See! You do want to do it with me!” he yips, delighted with himself.  
“I’m just making conversation!” she protests, with more laughter.  
“Well, if you must know, I have a very important yoga date with Liam,” he says smugly. But then changes his tone, getting down to business, “and then we’re watching the Leafs game with Shane. But how about Saturday?”  
“I’m going to an art thing,” and she hears the disappointment in her own voice without meaning to convey it.  
“Oh my god! You want me but you can’t have me!” Scott is hilarious, but insufferable.

By this time, he has parked the car in the gym parking lot. He turns his body toward her with a giddy, expectant look on his face.  
“Yeah, right,” she says more confidently, exiting the car without so much as a high five.  
She can feel him watching her as she struts into the gym. 

...

Part of Tessa’s workout involves holding a medicine ball above her head and moving her hips in big, slow circles. She’s suddenly aware that Scott is watching her from across the floor, and when they make eye contact, he wiggles his eyebrows at her like a cartoon character. She makes an embarrassed laugh sound in spite of herself - _this does look a bit like humping_ \- but then turns away, deciding against giving him the satisfaction of seeing her react. 

... 

Friday night rolls around. Tessa plans on a quiet night. She walks to get some groceries, stops in at a few shops on her way there and back. She’s never lived anywhere like Montreal, and she loves it. It’s as close to the feel of Paris - or Europe, anyway- , as you can get in Canada.  
She comes home, pours herself a glass of wine, queues up an old season of Suits, and settles in to watch. An episode and a half in, she’s fast asleep.  
She wakes up with a start to a knock on the door. When her eyes focus, she sees the time on the cable box under the TV - 10:53 p.m. 

She gets up and peers through the peephole. Scott. She opens the door.  
“Did I wake you up, T?” He looks a little surprised.  
“Oh gosh, I just uh… I guess I drifted off watching TV.” She scratches her head. She’s still coming to.  
“I can go-”  
“No! No, come in!” He steps inside, takes off his jacket and lays it over the back of a chair.

“Is the game over?” she asks a little groggily. His plans for the evening are slowly coming back to her.  
“Big win for the boys!” Scott tips up the brim of his Maple Leafs cap. He looks like a little kid as he does this. He never needs to feign enthusiasm for his team.  
“Yay!” Tessa smiles. “Can I get you anything? A drink, or?”  
“Uhh.. I think I’m good? Thanks?” Things are suddenly a little awkward.  
“Oh, ok. Well,...” Tessa gestures to the couch and they sit. 

Her mind starts racing as she realizes what Scott coming to her place late at night will probably lead to. She feels her breath shorten. She wants this, but she hadn’t quite planned for it.  
Scott turns toward her, and she struggles to meet his eye. He’s got one arm up on the back of the couch, and raises that hand to lightly touch her hair. He seems so calm.

“Tess. Is it ok that I’m here?”  
She feels redness creep up her neck, but she knows she doesn’t want him to go.  
“Yes, definitely. But maybe just give me a sec.” Scott nods eagerly and looks up at her as she stands. 

She goes to the washroom. Stares at herself in the mirror for a moment. Bares her teeth and sees the red wine stain, brushes them quickly. Smooths her brows with her fingers. Pulls her hair out of the big bun piled on her head and runs her fingers through it, flipping it into a deep side part. Puts on fresh deodorant. Peaks down the neck of her top to see what bra she’s wearing. Takes a big deep breath. 

When she comes back into the room, Scott has settled down into the couch, arms crossed over his stomach, squinting at the episode of Suits she had on when he knocked on the door. His feet are up on her coffee table.  
“Hey!” she says brightly, feeling more herself. Her perfectionist tendencies make spontaneity like this hard, but she’s getting better as she gets older. She wants to be spontaneous, at least sometimes.  
“Hi!” he replies, sitting up quickly and looking her over. She hangs back, and in a split second, he’s up off the couch and coming toward her.  
“Hi,” he says again, softly this time, inches from her face. He turns briefly to toss his hat onto the couch, and then reaches out to her waist with one hand, and moves the other to the back of her head, fingers in her hair. He kisses her. 

After a few minutes, she pulls back from him, reaches behind her and takes his hand from her lower back. She turns toward her room, and leads him there. 

They pause at her bed. She glances at him, and then crawls on and turns to lie on her side. He flops on the bed, facing her, they wiggle toward each other, giggling a little, wrap their arms around each other, and their mouths come together again. They lay that way for a while, enjoying each other. 

Then, Scott rolls Tessa onto her back, and moves on top of her. But seconds later, he pulls back, breathing hard, looking intently into her face.  
“Is this ok?”  
She can’t find her voice to reply, but nods, and mouths ‘yeah’. She runs her hands up under his T-shirt, and instantly reading her signal, he raises himself up on one elbow, whips it off over his head in a fell swoop, shaking it to the ground.  
He lowers himself back over her. She runs her hands up his bare back, traces with her fingers the muscle ridges she’s secretly noticed so many times through his clothes. 

He slips his hands up under her top. They stop kissing so that he can help her pull it over her head.  
Laying back, she looks up at his face, but he’s watching his own hand move from the top of her leggings, up her ribcage. His thumb moves over the small piece of fabric-covered metal that holds the two sides of her bra together, and then over the sheer mesh covering her right breast, slowing over her nipple.  
It feels good, and she arches up into his hand, breathes deeply. His gaze flits to her face, his lips parted in an half-smile, clearly riveted by her reaction to his touch. 

It’s strange, but thrilling, to see him like this, and for him to see her like this. It’s so good, it’s almost too much.  
Her heart pounding, she reaches up to his neck and pulls him down toward her mouth again. 

Taking this as a sign of enthusiasm from her, he slides back on top of her and really grinds his hips down into her, rhythmically, and the ache between her legs intensifies each time he does. His lips leave hers again, kissing her neck, making a trail down between her breasts, all the way to her belly button.  
Again, her back arches with the feeling, deeply this time, her head tipped so far back she’d be looking at her headboard upside down if she opened her eyes.  
His mouth on her body feels completely insane. 

It’s only when she realizes Scott has stopped that she straightens her body and looks down at him. He’s grinning up at her from her waistline, unabashedly enjoying the show she has been putting on for him.

Seeing him look at her like that, she’s struck by a jab of self-consciousness, suddenly reminded how much more experienced he is than her. Sure, she’s had a few boyfriends and a small (tiny) handful of flings, but Scott has dated consistently since he was 13. He exudes confidence nearly all the time, and this area is clearly no exception.  
It’s super hot, but she still feels shy. 

She thinks she hides it, but he must see something in her face.  
He crawls back up so that they are eye to eye. He places his hand on her stomach and tenderly rubs his thumb just above her navel.  
Nuzzles her jaw with his nose, pulls back a little so he can see her face.  
“Still ok, T?”

It wouldn’t take a scientist to know how much he’s been enjoying this, and she is touched that he is so attuned to how she’s feeling when he could be totally self-focused. She knows that if she told him to, he’d put his Leafs cap back on and hit the road in a heartbeat. It only makes her want him more.  
“More than ok,” she says, her voice husky this time, as she reaches up to tuck a wavy lock behind his ear.  
Wanting to show him, she delicately traces her fingers down his body, flattens her palm over the bulge in his pants.

“Ahhhhhhhhhhhhck” he groans, eyes squeezed shut. His reaction is so intense, she’s momentarily concerned she’s hurt him. But he untenses his face a second later, keeps his eyes closed, clearly savouring the feeling, so she continues.  
She watches his breath come in shallow bursts.  
She draws her hand back up a little, teases her fingertips under the waistbands of his pants and then his underwear. His eyes flash open.  
“I’m not going to last if you do that.”  
“Oh! Sorry!” She withdraws her hand quickly. He tips his head back, gives a quick, hearty laugh.  
“Never, _ever_ feel sorry about that,” he says emphatically.

He leans over, and kisses her mouth again, pushing her back onto the bed. Now his hand makes its way down her body, to her thigh and then back up again, stopping where he can rub between her legs with his thumb.  
_Oh my god_ , she thinks. She hears a whine escape her throat.  
“Does it feel good?” he whispers, practically growling, into her ear.  
“Uhhhhhh huh” she manages.

He presses his nose into the side of her face. Now, he gently pushes her leggings with one hand, and they start to come down over her hips. She lifts her pelvis a little to assist, and when they’re far enough down, she kicks them all the way off.

When she looks back up at Scott, he’s staring down at her panties. She follows his gaze as he brings his finger to trace the tiny lace trim along the top of them. Then, he runs his fingers down the smooth fabric stretched over the front of her, and slips a few fingers under so that he is touching her directly.  
She makes another guttural noise, a loud one. She can’t take it anymore.  
“Please. Fuck me,” she demands.  
She likes how she said it. She can tell Scott _loves_ how she said it. 

As if responding to a fire drill, he jumps off the bed to standing, pushing his pants and underwear to the ground, steps out of them.  
She watches him, awestruck by his magnificent body. It should be so familiar to her, but even after all this time, she’s never seen the whole thing before. The chain around his neck glints in the lamp light.

She’s still admiring him as he crouches, rummages around in his pants pile for a second, and stands back up holding a condom between his finger and thumb, grinning at her impishly. She watches closely as he quickly but carefully puts the condom on. When he’s done, he looks down at her lying on the bed.  
They hold each others’ gaze for a moment, as if silently acknowledging the significance of what they’re about to do. 

Tessa reaches to her panties, and slowly works them down her hips and legs, dangles them off her toe onto the floor.  
When she looks back up at Scott’s face, he’s staring, slack jawed, panting. He’s touching himself as we watches her.  
She follows suit, trails her hand down her body and puts two fingers between her lips.

“Ughhhhhhhh,” he groans at the sight of what she's doing, and in a flash, he’s on top of her, holding himself up on one arm, positioning himself to move inside her with the hand of the other.  
Again, he stops short. This time, he barely manages a coherent sound.  
“Ah k?” It’s not quite a word, but it’s definitely a question. He’s checking in with her again.  
She bites her lip, nods once, reaches to where he’s hovering over her and grazes his balls with her fingertips.

“Arrrrggghh ahh” he screws up his face, and driving his hips forward, enters her.   
She gasps. She closes her eyes for a moment, focused on the stinging, incredible feeling of him pushing inside her.

Before he thrusts, and he lowers his body so he’s right over her. She wraps her arms around his back, they kiss deeply.  
Then she feels his hips start to move, so she lifts hers to meet him. He squeezes his eyes shut, gives his head a quick shake.  
“Oh Tessa,” he breathes.  
He picks up his pace, she follows. It’s no surprise they move beautifully together. 

He claws at her left bra strap, and that side of her bra peels back.  
He steals a look down at her exposed breast, takes it in his hand and squeezes firmly as he gives his last big thrusts before he comes, hard, calling out.  
He collapses down on her, and they hug each other close, working to catch their breath.


	12. Chapter 12

##  January 2017 

###  Scott 

###  Scott carefully moves off of Tessa, and walks to the trash can across the room to throw out the condom. Turning to come back to bed, he pauses to take in the sight of her lying back, hair fanned around her. Naked except for her bra, half of which has been pulled back by him to reveal one breast. Her insane body contracting and expanding with her heavy breathing. Looking back at him intently. He’s 100% sure he has never seen anything more beautiful in his entire life.

He lies down beside her, takes her in his arms, plants kisses from her ear down her jaw to her mouth, and then presses his forehead against her head as he holds her close. She laughs softly and it’s the best sound in the world.  
“Ughhh, Tess. That was…” he shuts his eyes as he nuzzles her, shuddering with the pleasure of the very recent memory, but then remembers himself.  
“You’re next, though,” he says, determined not to be one of those assholes who doesn’t even notice whether his partner gets off. He runs his hand down her stomach. She laughs again, but turns onto her side toward him and his hand is put off its course. He settles for resting it on top of her hip.  
“There'll be plenty more time for that,” she murmurs into his ear.  
_Plenty more. Amen to that._  
“Maybe not tonight though,” she rolls back a little, smiles at him happily.  
“Ok if I stay?” he watches her face closely. She doesn’t always clearly say what she means, so he tries to be careful. But he can see she wants him to.  
“Oh definitely! Please do,” she says, pushing her head into the crook below his chin. It feels so nice. 

A minute later, she props herself up so she can look down into his face.  
“I was thinking though…” she looks wide awake again.  
“You need more sex to fall asleep?” he interjects eagerly. She laughs.  
“Ha! Well, I don’t think so… but umm..”  
He watches her closely, again trying to read her.  
“Didn’t we both… or I did, anyway… get physicals just in September? Like, just before the season?”  
“Yep, me too,” he nods.  
“Well, uhhhh” - her face is getting redder - “I got, umm, tested?, like, you know, and I’m… all good..”  
_Ooooooh_.  
“Me too!” he says quickly. “And me, too,” he adds more pointedly.  
“Oh! Good! I mean, great!” she smiles, clearly relieved but still halting. “And I, eee, I - I haven’t… been with anyone since then…” Now she gulps, looks at him wide-eyed.  
He gives her a look, reaches up and tucks her hair behind her ear.  
“Tessa, I haven’t slept with anyone since then, either.” He feels a tiny jab at his ego - several months is wayyy longer than he’d ever care to go -, but he’s mostly just happy he can say that honestly. He wants to reassure her as much as he can.  
“Oh, uhh, ok” - he can see she’s trying to be nonchalant, but he sees the relief on her face. She keeps going.  
“Well, and uhhhh, I have an… IUD?” her voice gets very high pitched. He knows what she’s referring to, and can’t resist going for a joke. Opens his eyes wide.  
“Uhh, that sounds like something you should have told me before we had sex!” She doesn’t realize right away that he’s kidding and shakes her head.  
“No, no, it’s not like a disease or anything! It’s, uh, a kind of birth control, like a really good kind!”  
Scott bursts out laughing.  
“I know what it is.” He pulls her toward him and presses their heads together to try to calm her down a bit. It’s freaking adorable to watch her talk to him about this stuff, and he finds it very endearing that she seems pretty shy about it but still makes herself do it. He feels proud of her for it.  
“That’s great about the IUD, though, I’m glad” he says softly into her ear, gives her a little kiss there. He’s surprised when she presses on.  
“So, I guess I’m saying, like, you know, as long as we’re not, um, with other people?” she squeaks, swallows, continues, “I don’t really think we need to use a… ahhhh.. Condom. Condoms.”  
Scott is - very happily - taken aback. This is what she was working up to? He blinks at her and before he can say anything, she continues rapidly.  
“I mean unless you want to use them, obviously, we totally can! I mean, if we do this again, if you want to. But the IUD - it has the birth control hormone in it, it’s like the best possible thing you can, uh, have, I’m told. And, oh god! like yeah, I don’t really mean anything by the other people thing except just, like, it doesn’t really work if we’re .. uhh.. with other people at the same time.” He grins slowly as he watches her babble nervously.  
“Well, ha! Uhh, not at the SAME time.” She is so flustered. It’s so cute. “But that was, uh, just something I was… thinking about.”  
He cocks an eyebrow, enjoying the thought of her thinking about sex, not to mention sex with him. But he quickly remembers the topic at hand, definitely doesn’t want to leave her hanging on this, and definitely doesn’t want to miss his opportunity.  
“I am so, _so_ down with that plan, T.” He looks her squarely in the eye and makes sure he sounds as certain as possible.  
“Ok,” she gives him a big smile. They kiss and she shimmies down, rests her head on his chest.  
He strokes her hair as he mulls over their conversation, pleased as punch. He makes a little groaning sound.  
“Now I think _I_ need more sex to fall asleep,” he muses. She laughs.  
“I’m sure you’ll manage,” she says, sitting up and nudging him gently off the bed so she can get up and pull the covers back. She pauses to unhook her bra, and drops it off her arm to the floor. He stands back a little and stares at her, fully naked for the first time.  
“You’re so beautiful.”  
She smiles, steps toward him, turns her face up to him.  
“You’re not half bad yourself.” Gives him a kiss.  
They crawl into her bed together, and drift off to sleep. 

... 

In the morning, Scott wakes up, instantly aware of his morning wood. The events of the night before wash over him in blissful waves. Incredible sex with Tessa, their conversation afterward, falling asleep together. He feels himself get harder, and he wiggles closer to her. He presses himself into her bum cheek. She stirs a little, makes a muffled, happy sound. He comes even closer, pulling her into his arms and running his hands over her.  
She returns his wiggle, pushing her backside up against him. It feels phenomenal. He growls. He’s going for it. In the next moment, he’s in her, and they fuck, spooning. Feeling himself inside with nothing between them is beyond. It’s transcendent. As she arches back, pushing her head into his shoulder, she tightens her muscles around his shaft and he can’t take how good it feels. He doesn’t have time to ask if he can come in her, so he pulls out and does it into his hand.  
“Holy. Fuck,” he says, rolling back momentarily, eyes closed, dizzy. Tessa turns over, grinning at him.  
“Hold that thought -” He zips to the bathroom to wash up. Returning, he gets back into bed beside her.  
“First, let me say - I swear, I am not usually this… fast. But last night was, uh, _very_ exciting. And then, just now, a) it’s morning, b) no condom, and c) you’re the hottest woman I’ve ever seen… I didn’t stand a chance.” She laughs, clearly delighted, but shakes her head as though to say, don’t even.  
“I loved it.”  
He smiles, very pleased with her feedback.  
“Well, good! Second, can I go down on you?” She turns bright red, but her face lights up and she nods eagerly.  
He doesn’t skip a beat, moves over her, kissing her mouth and making his way down. Slides his body so he lies flat on his stomach, her thighs on either side of his head. He nuzzles his face gently against her slit, breathing her in.  
He flicks his tongue against her lightly at first and then increases his pressure, and before long she’s ooohing. He loves hearing this from her. He’s put some effort into honing his skill in this area (literal and figurative), and he thinks he’s pretty good at it. But he’s always happy for positive reinforcement.  
Before he knows it, her hands are in his hair, and she’s getting loud.  
“Ah, yeah,” she moans. He eagerly continues.  
“Coming” she yelps in a tone he’s rarely if ever heard from her, and it is incredibly hot. Her body relaxes and she pushes his head away from her.  
He scrambles up the bed to be beside her, feels ridiculously proud of himself. Watches happily as she squeezes her eyes shut, panting, coming down.  
“That was really good,” she finally manages to say, eyes still closed.  
Scott shakes his head slowly.  
“K, that was so, so hot. I’m pretty much ready to go again right now. I’m kinda worried we’ll never get out of here.” He tries to appear helpless in the predicament.  
At this, she laughs, then gives him a look.  
“Well, I have a hair appointment in an hour, so I, at least, need to get up pretty much right away.”  
“Ok,” he sighs happily, “one more minute,” he says, snuggling up to her. She giggles, and snuggles back. 

... 

Twenty-five minutes later, they leave Tessa’s apartment together. Walk to the corner with their hands in their pockets. This is where their paths diverge. She turns her face up and smiles at him. He feels overcome with love for her.  
“Meet you back here in 2 hours?” he asks her hopefully, but knowing full well they both need to carry on with their days. She chuckles, gives him a little wink.  
“Thanks for stopping by.”  
And she turns to carry on her way. He stands for a while, watching her go.


	13. Chapter 13

##  January 2017 

###  Tessa 

###  Monday at the rink. Tessa and Scott stand at the boards, listening to Patch - at least, supposedly listening. He’s getting into the technical aspects of one of their free dance lifts. Tessa glances down at Scott’s hand resting centimeters from hers on the top of the boards, and she flashes back to the night before. 

How Scott had invited her over for dinner.  
How they’d had sex on his couch before the food was even ready, barely managing to get any of their clothes off first.  
How they did eventually eat the meal he made, facing each other from opposite ends of the same couch, legs intertwined, and plates on theirs laps.  
How they’d cheered when Scott got a text announcing the birth of Charlie and Nicole’s new baby, and toasted his arrival with their coffee mugs (Scott’s only drinking vessels) of water.  
How they’d laughed until they cried over Scott’s misunderstanding/mispronunciation of the baby’s name (“Cruz?... Is that, like, crud and fuzz?”).  
How Scott had pulled Tessa over to his end of the couch so she was lying across his chest, and holding her close, had asked how they were going to “handle us”.  
How Tessa had responded - too quickly - “I think we need to keep it to ourselves.”  
How she’d pushed herself up to look at him and hurried to add “for now”. But how a hurt look had already flashed across his face.  
How she’d tried to explain her apprehensions - but barely managed anything useful. How he’d said he understood, but she wasn’t sure he had.  
How Tessa felt ill on her walk home. Mystified by how Scott could be ready to be so open, cursing herself for being so closed.  


“Does it make sense?” Tessa realizes Patch is looking at her. She shakes her head apologetically.  
“Sorry?”  
Tessa glances quickly at Scott, and without any further prompting, he relays what was said moments earlier. She watches, grateful, as he explains, but thinks she sees the slightest shadow in his eyes.  


In the car on the way home, she forces herself to try to explain again.  
“I keep thinking about last night,” she starts. Scott stares straight ahead, and doesn’t say anything, so she continues.  
“I would never want you to think ...anything other than I’m so happy this is... happening.” He keeps watching the road, but she sees a small change in his face. Thinks it softens a little.  
“I just,.. I’m still processing what this... means. I’m really not sure I could handle having to deal with other people knowing right now. You know how people are about us," she pauses, sighs. "You know me.”  
A few seconds pass before he responds.  
“I know.” He nods. Puts his hand on her knee and gives it a squeeze. But he keeps staring straight ahead. 

When they pull up in front of Tessa’s place, Scott puts the car in park. She feels a little rush, thinking he’s planning to follow her inside. _My god, he can’t go a day…_  
But he keeps his seat belt buckled, turns to her.  
“I’ve been thinking, too.”  
She stops short with her hand on the door handle.  
“Maybe we should try to slow things down.”  
_Oh_. She feels the colour drain from her face.  
“I wasn’t on my game today. I was pretty caught up thinking about the weekend, thinking about tonight, tomorrow…Basically, trying not to think.” He says the last part with a tired, exasperated laugh-like sound. But it’s not a laugh. Suddenly, she realizes he seems exhausted. “And you were distracted, too.”  
“Yeah,” she says quietly.  
“I feel like I’ve been pretty delusional, actually, with all this.” He exhales. “We’ve got so much to lose.”  
She looks at her lap. Starts to wonder how she can get out of the car as fast as possible.  
“I don’t just mean about our skating. I mean us, too.” This last part takes her by surprise, and she glances up at him. They hold each other’s eyes. Their shared history hangs in the air between them.  
He starts again.  
“This got _intense_ fast, and I blame myself for that.” Now he looks down.  
Without thinking, she shakes her head, and she reaches out, puts her hand on his where it rests on his leg.  
“I meant what I said. I’m so happy, Scott.” She wishes she could explain better, but nothing else comes.  
He looks at her hand on his, covers it with his other hand and squeezes. He thinks for another minute, takes a long breath.  
“Maybe... What if we just work on weekdays, status quo. On weekends, we can... be together, if you want to. Well, non-competition weekends, I guess. I think we should try that and see how it goes.”  
She feels a little burn of shame when he says ‘if you want to.’ She's failed to show him how much she wants this.  
“I think that’s a really good idea.” she says, and most of her means it. Scott peels his bottom hand out from their hand sandwich and balls it in a fist, going for the bump.  
"It's a plan," he says, exhaling again, pressing his lips together and looking her in the eye. He seems vulnerable in this moment, and it hurts her heart.  
She makes herself smile at him, and bumps back before she leaves the car. 

Tessa drops her bags in the foyer of her apartment, flops onto the sofa, buries her face in a pillow, and lets herself cry. She cries out of tiredness, and out of frustration with herself. She cries because she hates that she hurt Scott’s feelings. She cries for the innocence lost between them - now that they’ve crossed _The Line_ , there is no going back, ever. Before this, they have sometimes, barely, crossed it, but have always rushed to correct themselves - to pretend they didn’t almost kiss, to shrug off a sloppy night or a handsy hug, to stifle the jealously they’d feel towards each other’s crushes or relationships.  
But now, they’re so far past that line, they can’t even see it from where they are. They have no choice but to navigate life on the other side of it.  
_Why can’t we be normal?_ She heaves another big sob.  
But then, she actually starts to laugh at herself - _such self-pity!_ She knows she, and Scott, have been incredibly lucky in almost every possible aspect of life, and now is no exception.  
She recognizes her little meltdown feels good, in that weird way feeling sorry for yourself can feel good. She knows instinctively she needed to feel those things- she needed to mourn the loss of what she and Scott had before, what they were before. That Tessa and Scott are gone, and that’s a big deal.  
She takes a deep breath, feels the high that follows a big cry.  
_The plan might be ok_ , she thinks to herself as she turns on her back and gazes up at her living room ceiling.

... 

That week, Tessa finds she does focus better in training than she had on Monday, or the week before. Not quite back up to her spartan work ethic of the fall, but better. She and Scott are super warm with each other, but they focus on training, they keep conversation light. They don’t really touch each other outside of training. She's not caught up wondering what's going to happen. It seems to work itself out pretty well. And best of all, they actually have fun sometimes. On Thursday, they have a meeting with their B2Ten team, and the energy is great. Tessa is delighted that things feel really back on track.  
And of course, she has the secret pleasure of looking forward to the weekend as it draws nearer. 

But on Friday, Tessa wakes up feeling anxious. Rod Black and a TSN crew are coming to the rink to do an interview with her and Scott, to be aired during Nationals. This is their first media event since things have changed so drastically between them. She knows - or least hopes - Scott will make an effort to keep a lid on things, but the reality is, even his best effort at staying quiet isn’t always up to her rigorous standard. On top of that, Rod is super friendly and they’ve known him forever, but he’s a bit of an oaf - he’s famous for putting his foot in his mouth, for asking awkwardly-worded questions.  
_And, last but not least, it’s Friday the 13th. Perfect,_ she thinks as she presses her eyes shut one last time before rolling out of bed. She stops by her dresser on her way out of the room to rub her grandma’s necklace between her fingers - a comforting good luck ritual.

At the rink, after practice, she sees Rod’s orange glow coming toward them from the far end of the rink as the producer, Jamie, sets up the shot. Rod will sit a few rows up in the bleachers, looking down on them for the interview, and then Jamie has Tessa sit on a railing with Scott standing right in behind her, so her back is touching his shoulder. For a minute she’s comforted to have him close, feels herself calm down a little. But then she’s also reminded of all the things she does _not_ want him to say in this interview. She gives Scott a quick smile over her shoulder.  
“Ready?” she asks under her breath, willing him to understand that he needs to stay on message. But he just gives her a dreamy smile back.  
_Oh my god_ , she thinks desperately. 

Rod takes his place, the lights go up, and they’re on.  
“Last time we talked on the verge of the comeback, you said you were anxious, you were nervous, but you were excited... A few months later, what does your head say, what does your heart say?”  
Tessa winces momentarily at ‘what does your heart say’.  
_Don’t you dare_ , she thinks frantically as she glances up over her shoulder at Scott.  
“Well, I think a lot has changed,” he starts to answer. She stops breathing. But Scott pulls it out of the fire.  
“Now we’re anxious, we’re nervous, and we’re excited!” She lets out a relieved laugh, thinks maybe it sounded a little too loud, but oh well. 

Mercifully, Rod’s questions mainly focus on training, on working with Patch and Marie. Tessa feels a little awkward throughout, especially when she can feel Scott staring adoringly at her when it’s her turn to talk, but as she senses the interview is wrapping up, she feels a flood of relief wash over her.  
_This has been totally fine_ , she thinks to herself. _You had nothing to worry about._  
And then Rod asks his last question.  
“Your connection is unparalleled in this sport. I guess you must both think of it as a gift that you have always had each other’s back, as well.”  
Scott launches into an answer before Tessa can even open her mouth.  
“We’re a little bit wiser than we were before, but we’re starting to understand just how special”- he turns his head and looks intently into Tessa’s eyes- “our relationship is.”  
She gulps.  
She looks quickly at Rod to see how he’s reacting. A big dopey smile - of course he’s eating this up.  
“You know, it’s crazy that we’ve spent this much time together, and we still like to spend more time together. And working with Tessa in every single part of our career is such a joy, it’s just crazy. I didn’t think you’d meet someone who’s so professional yet so much fun to work with and so inspired and driven, and so… I would say it’s a little bit a blessing, I guess. Don’t tell her that.”  
Tessa feels her face getting hot, and she scrambles to cut Scott off.  
“That’s nice, thank you!” she practically chokes, laughs nervously, and hurries on.  
“But it is cool to be in this position now when we’re challenging ourselves as athletes, and it’s fun to watch Scott in the gym and it’s fun to see him push himself and that driven determined athlete that I’ve always known is totally thriving.”  
She feels her heart thudding in her chest as Rod wraps the interview up. 

As soon as they get the cue, she hustles to hop off the railing, not wanting to raise further curiosity by leaning up against Scott any longer than necessary. When she’s a few metres away, she glances back at him, and he’s already chatting with one of the tech guys. But he looks over and flashes her a huge grin. She feels herself flush pink again. She can’t deny his little speech was incredibly sweet, even if it does make her crazy that he felt the need to make it on national TV. 

As there is a plan to grab drinks and dinner with the TSN crew, Tessa heads to the change room. When she takes her phone out of her bag, Scott has somehow managed to send her a text in the short time since the interview ended.  
“So you love watching me in the gym hey? You are filthy”.  
She laughs and shakes her head.  
_Scott Moir. You will be the death of me._


	14. Chapter 14

##  January 2017 

###  Scott 

###  After the interview, Scott and Tessa take the TSN crew to a cozy, cavernous pub in Old Montreal. Rod is affable as always but doesn’t last long - places to go, people to see, yada yada. But Jamie and most of the rest of the crew are in it for the long haul.

From their big table, Scott watches Tessa at the bar, laughing as she tells a story to two guys from the crew. They are both obviously enchanted with her. Scott feels that heady mix of jealousy and pride - everybody wants her, but he gets to go home with her at the end of the night. At least, he sure as hell hopes so. 

He smiles sheepishly to himself, thinking back on the day. The dear in the headlights look she gave him over her shoulder when he started talking about their ‘relationship’ during the interview. He knows he was pushing it. But he couldn’t help himself. 

As if reading his mind, Tessa catches Scott’s eye from across the room, arches an eyebrow, and then smiles.  
_TGIF_ , he thinks with a sigh. Their plan to put romantic and sex stuff aside during the week seemed to go pretty well from his perspective, - he felt they did focus better, worked better - but he’s very ready to put it back front and centre. 

An hour later, back at the table and Jamie is regaling them with inside stories from the LPGA tour. Tessa yawns, trying but not quite managing to stifle it. Scott playing the role of Responsible Designated Driver, raises his eyebrows at her.  
“Time for me to give you a ride home, T?” He is desperate to get her out of here.  
Jamie and Dave, the camera guy, overhear this and scoff.  
“Alright Moir, we can drop her off but the night is young for the rest of us!”  
Scott chuckles, glances at Tessa, who looks back at him with an amused, helpless look on her face. _Crap._  
“Well, let’s hit the road and we’ll see what happens, boys.” Scott stands and throws some money down on the table to cover the last round of drinks.  
“What a swell guy, eh!” crows Dave. He stands up too, and claps Scott on the back.  
Scott smiles but he’s busy working through how he can politely shake these guys off. Not that Jamie isn’t great - they’ve spent lots of time together over the years and it’s always fun. And he hasn’t met Dave until today but he seems much the same. But it has nothing to do with them. Scott has more pressing things on his mind. 

In the car, Jamie scrolls through his phone in the back seat and announces that the third period of the Leaf’s game is about to start and they’re up 3-1.  
“Hotel lobby bar has lots of big screens - let’s book it!” he demands happily.  
“Step on it!” seconds Dave.  
“Join us, T?” Scott glances at Tessa who is sitting up front with him.  
“Oh no, thanks, I’m homeward bound.” She gives him a little smile.  
Scott’s hands effectively tied, he pulls up in front of Tessa’s. She twists into the back seat to peck Jamie and Dave on their cheeks.  
“Night! Thanks for the ride!” she says sweetly, as she leans over to do the same to Scott. She rests her hand on his thigh ever so briefly in the process.  
_This better be the fastest period of hockey in history_ , Scott thinks. He loves his team, but the math is simple: naked Tessa > hockey.  
“See you soon,” he says, hearing the desperation in his own voice, but not caring. Jamie and Dave are a few too many in and are oblivious. Tessa gives Scott a bemused look over her shoulder as she slips out of the car. 

As soon as the game ends, Scott pleads exhaustion and, having safely deposited the guys at their hotel, doesn’t worry about leaving them as they tuck into their next round of drinks, ignoring their insistence that he stay.  
He zips back to his place, forcing himself to obey traffic laws on the way, albeit begrudgingly ( _No right on red! What the fuck, Montreal!_ ). Ditches his car at home, doesn’t waste time going inside, practically sprints back to Tessa’s. _Please be awake_. He sees a light on. _Hallelujah_. Takes the stairs two steps at a time, resists the urge to bang on her door. 

When she answers, she peeks around the door, and as she closes it behind him, he sees she’s in some kind of small, silky, see-through nightie thing. She looks unbelievable. He feels his eyes bug out.  
She turns to face him and pauses a moment smiling at the ground, seems to bashfully enjoy his reaction. Then she comes toward him.  
“I was hoping you’d stop by” she murmurs, playfully reaching up and grabbing the lapel of his coat in her hands. “Come with me.”  
She walks backward, dragging him toward her room. He follows, lightheaded, for once more than happy to let her lead. 

She pushes him backward onto her bed, climbs up and straddles his hips. Pushes his coat open. Runs her hands down the front of his body and slips her finger tips under the bottom of his shirt. She looks giddy, sheepishly pleased with herself. He wonders briefly if he's dreaming.  
But he can feel his erection straining against his pants, and squeezed under the weight of her bearing down on him. It is a fantastic, excruciating, very _real_ feeling.

Just when he thinks he might legitimately pass out, she slides off of him to standing, and he lifts his head to watch as she stoops to graze her mouth over his bare stomach where she pushed his shirt up. He gets a glimpse down the top of her little lingerie dress thing as she bends.  
“Jesus,” he says under his breath, and then he hears her giggle as she nuzzles along the waistband of his pants. 

He’s determined not to bust early this time, but she’s not going to make it easy for him. He squeezes his eyes shut.  
_You can do this. This is isn’t_ that _sexy_ , he uselessly tries to convince himself.  
Then he feels her undo his belt.  
Unzip his fly.  
Pull his pants open.  
Tug them down his hips.  
When she runs her hands down the front of his underwear, he really braces himself, scrunches up his face, pleads with himself to hold it together.

But then she stands up straight again, steps back and starts to pull his shoes and socks off, laughing to herself at the less arousing task. He knows full well this is a short-lived break before she continues her glorious torture, but he tries to make the most of it, get some control over himself. Take some big deep breaths. Re-group. _Tries_ not to think about how unbelievably hot it is to see her take control like this.

Moments later, she pulls his pants the rest of the way off, and then she slowly hooks her fingers around the elastic band of his underwear and pulls it down. His penis springs feverishly to attention.  
“I can do this,” he says absently to himself, accidentally out loud. Tessa bursts out laughing.  
“You want to do this? Like to yourself?” she asks cheekily.  
“Haaaa. Haaaaa,” he tries to laugh but mostly just breathes desperately, only barely able to get her joke. “No - no, that’s all you. I mean, if... _Please_.”  
She laughs again, but this time it’s throatier, lustier. She’s standing between his legs as they hang off the side of her bed, and she strokes his upper thighs with her thumbs. He takes a big breath, closing his eyes again to help him focus.  
“I’m just working on...not cutting things short,” he explains through shallow breaths.  
“I see,” she says, with laughter in her voice.  
He feels her hands run down his legs, and then feels her warm breath against his pubic bone. 

_Blisters. Pus. Mascots. Roadkill. Cheez Whiz. Dog farts. Toe nails. Algebra. Dirty toilet._  
He makes a last ditch attempt to fill his mind with the least erotic things he can think of.  
But then she takes him in her mouth, and his brain short circuits. 

By some miracle, he doesn’t blow immediately.  
He does gasp and groan and cry, experience true and genuine bliss, lose all sensation in every part of his body that is _not_ in her mouth.  
But he doesn’t lose it.  
Until he almost does.  
“Tessaaaaaa,” understanding immediately, she stops, kisses just below his belly button instead.  
He pants, eyes closed, relieved, still holding on to his orgasm for dear life, wondering at how he has managed this far.

When he opens his eyes, Tessa is climbing back onto the bed. She swings her leg over him and straddles him again, holding her nightie up around her waist.  
She takes him in her hand, and lowers herself onto him. She makes a beautiful little sound when he’s all the way inside.  
“ _JESUS!_ ” Scott yelps. She puts her hands on his chest and starts to move.

He disappears, consumed by the feeling of the way she goes back and forth on him.  
He’s completely lost, until he has one last, fleeting, conscious thought.  
_Switch positions. Last longer._  
With that, he opens his eyes, moves his hands to her waist, and lifts her up and off of him.  
He pushes himself to standing, shakes off his coat, and fumbles to unbutton his flannel shirt with his shaky fingers and drops that, too. He’s sweating like crazy.  
He reaches up and runs his hands through his mess of hair, gazes at Tessa who has come to kneeling on the bed, watching him expectantly. Waiting for him, still in that nightgown thing. Very possibly the sexiest thing he’s ever seen. 

He climbs up on the bed beside her and they face each other, standing up tall on their knees. They press their foreheads together - even after all of this, they still haven’t kissed since last weekend. Their open mouths come together.  
_Oh yeah, this is nice_ , he thinks, barely.  
He hugs her into him, then runs his hands down over her bum and back up under her nightie, breaking their kiss to pull it up over her head. 

He gently but firmly turns her around and presses himself right up against the back of her so their bodies are flush. He wraps one arm around her waist from behind, playfully catching her arms in his grasp, and then reaches around and touches her breasts with his other hand.  
“Mmmmm” she leans back into him. 

He moves his hand down the front of her body, tenderly slips one and then a second finger inside her. She’s so wet. It’s sinful. His thumb finds her clit and she whimpers. He kisses her neck.  
She delicately frees one arm from his embrace, and reaches down and moves his hand so that his fingers are rubbing her instead of his thumb. She uses his hand as an extension of her own.  
He wants her to teach him, tries as best he can with his semi-functioning brain to pay attention to what she’s showing him she likes.  
She continues moving his hand, gradually moving it faster and firmer against her, and then she reaches up behind her with her other hand, grabs the hair at the nape of his neck, arches her back.  
“Ahhhhhhhhh,” she shudders against him. Moves his hand away from her and rests back against him, breathing hard.  
“Jesus, Tessa. Did you just come?”  
She laughs happily at his surprised tone.  
“Um, yes,” she steals a sly glance over her shoulder at him.  
“Holy,” he wraps his arms more tightly around her, swaying her gently back and forth, trying for the life of him to remember what just happened so he can - hopefully- do it again next time. It seemed too easy, too insanely sexy, to be real.

Having had a - _delightful_ \- break from direct stimulation himself, he’s aching for her again. He starts bending forward slowly, pressing his chest into her back, and she moves with him, coming onto her hands and knees.  
“This ok?” he whispers gruffly in her ear, bent over her.  
“Oh yeah,” she whispers back, laughs again, backs up into him a little. _Oh boy_.  
He comes up to kneeling, rubs his hands down her back, and then guides himself into her. They both gasp when he’s inside.  
He thrusts once.  
“Oh god” she gasps again. He pauses momentarily to make sure it was a good oh god, and then thrusts again.  
“Ughhh that’s so good,” she breathes.  
That's all the confirmation he needs, and can’t hold back. He moves faster, fucking her hard.  
Finally, he croaks.  
“Tess can I come in you?”  
“Uhhhh, maybe don’t?” she calls back. He pulls out of her quickly.

“There’s kleenex right there,” she says softly, nodding at the nightstand. Scott hops off the bed, grabs the box, does his best to clean up.  
“Thanks,” she chuckles softly, gets off the bed, and turn her face up to kiss him. “Be right back”.


	15. Chapter 15

##  January 2017 

###  Tessa 

###  When Tessa returns to her room, Scott has burrowed down under the covers. He watches her walk back to the bed. She feels a pang of self-consciousness, but makes a concerted effort to hold his eye, keep her shoulders back. She feels sexier when she projects confidence, even if she doesn’t always 100% feel it. 

When she reaches the bed, she tries to crawl seductively over him, but he grabs her and pulls her down onto him and rolls her around, tickling her, as she laughs. When he finally lets her go, she scrambles under the covers, and they lay on their sides, facing each other. Studying each other. She looks closely at the curve of his long nose, his unusual, beautiful downturned eyes. His rakish hair. He’s always been cute, but when did he get so handsome? 

But then he interrupts her train of thought.  
“Am I dead? Is this heaven?” he asks suspiciously into the silence, and she laughs, shaking her head.  
“I don’t think so?” still laughing.  
“Yeah, but we have _good_ sex, right? Like, _crazy_ good?” he persists, in a goofy, analytical way, as though trying to get to the bottom of this. She feels herself blush.  
“Well, I think so!” she says eagerly, and she certainly means it. She’s not sure when or if she’ll ever been ready to openly express this, but she has no doubt that the sex she has had with Scott is the best sex she’s ever had. 

Now he turns a little, looks up at the ceiling, contemplating.  
“Cause that was, ahhhh,... hmmm, i mean, _quite possibly_ the best hour of my life. From you answering the door in the lingerie, ah, thing - _Wow_ , by the way - “ he turns to give her a serious look and although she’s laughing, she blushes again, pleased. “To the way you dragged me in here, to the... I mean the blow job?!” he squeaks incredulously. “And the.. You on top… and the .. you.. Coming? like that?? … and the - can I say this? - the _doggie_ …” - he whispers the last word, as if it’s either profane or sacred, or somehow maybe both. He shakes his head. “Yep. Yes. Best hour of my life.”  
She rolls around beside him, laughing a deep, delighted laugh. She finally catches her breath.  
“What about when we won the Olympics!”  
He sticks out his lower lip, nods thoughtfully.  
“Yes, also very good. Only took 4 minutes, though.”  
She laughs again, rolls her eyes. 

They lie quietly for a few minutes. Her laughter quiets down and she watches him get dozy.  
“Scott?” she asks him.  
“Tessa,” he responds happily, sleepily.  
She feels herself turning red, hates that she’s so shy to talk about these things.  
“Sorry about the… coming...in me… thing,” she can barely choke this out.  
He furrows his brow immediately, starts to sit up a little and shakes his head. He’s awake now.  
“Sorry? Don’t be sorry.”  
She can tell he’s sincere, and she feels so grateful. He’s a good guy.  
“Yeah? Ok. I just… I have the IUD and everything, but I don’t want to push it too much, I guess.”  
“I totally get that, T,” he settles back down on his pillow and reaches over, tucks her hair behind her ear. “The barbaric male pig in me in just had to ask.” He gives her a sheepish look.  
Now she shakes her head.  
“The fact that you asked means you, by definition, are _not_ a pig.” She scooches closer and leaves tiny kisses on his nose and eyelashes. He closes his eyes, allowing himself to be adored. When she pulls back, he doesn’t open them again. 

...

The next morning, they wake up, have sex. Laze around in bed together for an hour. Scott follows Tessa to the shower - more sex. They make coffee and oatmeal, settle in to watch some TV. Flip around channels until they agree on Modern Family reruns. 

Tessa gets up after a while to do some tidying. Scott moves onto the floor to stretch, turns off the TV and plays music from his phone. She smiles looking on at him from across the apartment, singing away at the top of his lungs, eyes closed. A country song she doesn’t recognize.  
It’s different to see him not rushing around, not training, not talking about training, not dealing with fans or competitors or coaches or media, or anyone but her. Even after spending thousands of hours of their lives together, this is a kind of intimacy they haven’t shared before. So many times when they were younger, when she’d suggest they hang out, Scott would be in a big hurry to get back home to hang out with whatever girlfriend he happened to have at the time, or to see his friends. Over time, she just assumed he wasn't that interested in hanging out with her. Another way things have changed so much. It’s really nice. 

After accomplishing a few household tasks, she pours some Chicago Mix she keeps as a treat into a bowl and comes back to join Scott who’s turning on the TV again. She usually eats it very slowly- one piece of cheddar, one piece of caramel, wait a minute-, making a concerted effort to pace herself so she can really savour one of the few indulgences she allows herself when she’s in the thick of training.  
When she puts the bowl down on the coffee table, Scott eats 80% of it within 90 seconds. She watches in amused amazement as he inhales it absent-mindedly. She gets up smiling to herself and refills the bowl. 

...

Feeling dozy, Tessa stretches out to nap on the couch. When she wakes up, Scott is still sitting at the far end, deeply engrossed in an episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians.  
She smiles sleepily and nudges him gently with her foot to get his attention. He looks over at her, smiles, grabs her foot in his hand. Turns his attention back to the TV.  
“I had no idea you were a fan,” she teases him, her voice hoarse from having just woken up.  
He furrows his brow, keeps watching.  
“I dunno if I am. I find it really disturbing that the character named Scott is such a dick.”  
Tessa laughs.  
“Oh! Well, he’s gone now. This is an old one.”  
“Sounds like there’s room for a new Scott,” he puts his finger to his lip. “I think I’d fit in.”  
“You’d probably have to date one of the sisters,” Tessa points out.  
“True,” he says doubtfully.  
“Kylie?” she asks. He shoots her a horrified look.  
“Yuck, Tessa! Too young!”  
“She’s older now!”  
“Not old enough,” he says decisively, shaking his head and looking back at the screen.  
“Kourtney? She’s probably available now that Scott Disick’s out of the picture. I think she’s the most naturally beautiful. And she’s a little more normal, I guess. Relatively.”  
Scott thinks this over for a minute, as if he really needs to decide.  
“You wouldn’t mind?” He looks over at her again, eyebrows raised.  
She laughs.  
“Hmmm, I guess I’d probably mind a little, yeah.”  
He smiles at her, and tightens his grip on her foot. She can see this answer pleases him. 

Suddenly, he lunges over across the couch, flops all of his weight down on her and lays his face against hers.  
“Mmmmmmm” he says lazily.  
She wraps her arms around him, rubs his back. It’s a little hard to breathe, but she loves the heft of him on top of her.

“I guess you probably didn’t know that sweet-salty popcorn stuff makes me horny,” he says innocently, eyes closed.  
“Haha!” she laughs from under him. “That’s pretty weird!”  
“Haters gon’ hate,” he says sadly, shimmying against her a little. She can feel him getting hard.  
She slides her hands down to his bum, gives it a little squeeze.  
“Oooh,” he coos. Turns his head, and kisses her. 

They make out languidly for a while, gradually reaching down and pushing at each other’s pants.  
He rubs himself against her a few times, and she thinks he’s about to push his way inside of her.  
But instead, he lifts himself up to look at her, smiles and wiggles his eyebrows, starts scooching backwards as he trails his face down the front of her body. Gently pulls her shirt up a little, blows a big raspberry on her stomach, and she shriek-laughs in surprise.  
“That was that thing that turns you on, right?” he asks, looking up at her with a big smile on his face.  
She laughs at him and shakes her head vigorously.  
“Oh, lower?” he asks, still feigning ignorance.  
She laughs again, feels her cheeks burn red as she nods yes.  
She watches his head dip between her legs, feels his tongue part her lips. She tilts her head back and closes her eyes.  
“Ahhh,” she breathes. 

She loves that he has his hands under her bum, pressing her toward him like he can’t get enough of her. When it gets even better, and she gets even closer, he holds her even more firmly to counteract her squirming.  
Just as she’s about to come, he moves quickly and slips two fingers in her, and starts licking her faster with the very tip of his tongue.  
“Ahhhhhhhhhhhh oh my god Scott!” she cries, feels every muscle in her body tense and then reverberate, waves crashing through her. She feels herself grip his fingers tightly, and then release them. 

She melts into the sofa, heart pounding so hard she feels it in her throat. Best orgasm she’s had in a long time - and she’s had some good ones lately.  
She looks up at Scott, who is now up on his knees looming over her, pants still down around his thighs, making his way back up toward her and looking hilariously, adorably proud.  
He plops back down on top of her, and she wraps her arms around him again and whispers in his ear.  
“That was unbelievable.”  
He pushes back a little to look at her face, and he looks thoroughly delighted. It’s so sweet.

She reaches down and strokes him gently a few times with her hand, watches his face as he closes his eyes to enjoy the sensation. She guides him toward her, runs his head across her wet opening a few times before letting him go so he can enter her.

...

A while later, Scott hops off the couch to take a call from his Uncle Paul about their skate shop. Scott runs his hand through his hair, pacing around the foyer as he talks . When he comes back to the living room, Tessa frets that maybe she should be running errands, getting stuff done, too. Scott quickly points out that they’ll be at Nationals the following weekend.  
“And you won’t be able to use me as your sex slave there,” he notes helpfully. “At least, not as easily.”  
“Oh my god!” she cries, playing up how scandalized she is, tossing a cushion at him.  
But he’s right, and she’s not going anywhere.  
They continue their lovely, decadent day in together.

...

When it’s dark outside, she wonders aloud whether she should make them something to eat.  
“Maybe I should make us dinner,” she says breezily.  
“Oh yeah! I’ll have the poached eggs, with a side of poached eggs,” quips Scott.  
“Hey, hey! I have range!” she says defensively. “I don’t only know poached eggs.”  
“Ok,” he makes an extremely irritating ‘whatever you say’, face. 

Tessa, determined to prove Scott wrong, heads to the kitchen, glances around. She knows she has good cheese, decent bread. A bit of butter.  
_Grilled cheese_ , she thinks. _Pretty sure I know that one_.  
She quietly pulls a container from the freezer. Soup her mum made last time she was here. Her spicy lentil - a classic Kate recipe. 

When the food’s ready, she takes an extra moment to plate everything nicely.  
_Points for presentation_ , she hears her mum’s voice in her head.  
“Dinner!” she calls cheerily, setting the dishes out.  
Scott appears at the table, looking mildly impressed.  
“Not an egg in sight!” he says.  
“That’s right,” she says smugly. She doesn’t mention she didn’t make the soup, merely reheated it.  
He sits.  
“Nice lookin’ soup!” he takes a close look, gives it a sniff. “From a fancy can?” he asks, lifting the spoon to his mouth, eyes on Tessa.  
“No, I froze it,” she says primly. This is technically true - she was tasked with physically placing it in the freezer by her mother.  
“Kate made this!” Scott yells within seconds of tasting it, dropping the spoon back in the bowl and pointing an accusing finger at Tessa.  
“Dammit!” she cries, slapping her hand on the counter.  
Scott laughs boisterously, deeply impressed with himself.  
Tessa takes a seat across from him, deflatedly takes a bite of the soup.  
“Ah. This does taste like Kate made it,” she smiles ruefully. “It’s really good.”  
“It is,” says Scott, grinning across the table at her.

After they eat, Scott insists on washing the few dishes there are. They then spend 25 minutes bickering over a movie to watch, finally agreeing on the Wedding Singer. They start the movie and in half that time, Tessa is fast asleep on Scott’s shoulder. 

...

Late the next morning, they stand in the foyer as Scott gets ready to leave. They really have no choice but to burst their little bubble and move on with their respective weekend chores. Saturday was already the least productive day either of them has had in months. 

Scott pulls Tessa into a big hug, and she rests her head on his shoulder.  
“Ughhhhhhhh I don’t want to leave,” he grimaces. She squeezes him. She doesn’t want him to leave either, but she won’t encourage him. They’ve had their fun and need to be responsible.  
“It’s going to be a long busy week,” she finally says, thinking ahead to the circus that will be Nationals. “This was pretty perfect.”  
She pulls back a little and looks up at him.  
He looks into her eyes and just nods slowly.  
“Yeah,” he says quietly after a long while.


	16. Chapter 16

##  January 2017 

###  Tessa 

###  Tessa and Scott delve head first into the crazy week that will be Canadian Nationals. They head to Ottawa Tuesday, gearing up for practices, media, fans, and most importantly: competition. They follow the ‘plan’ without question. Of course, it’s more important than ever. The pressure’s on, and focus is crucial. Back to business. 

But after their magical weekend in together at Tessa’s, she can feel her own sense of the boundaries start to blur. A huge part of her wants to be focused, professional, detached, objective. A machine. But another big part - a part she has a harder time controlling - wants to be with Scott all the time. She wants to hold his hand, wants to feel him close to her.

They continue to maintain a safe distance from each other in the evenings, and off the ice generally, but during their practices, she can’t resist leaning against him, trying to stay near him. He doesn’t say a word about it, just returns her affection. He rubs her back, pats her bum. He holds her tenderly by her waist and runs his hands up and down her arms as they skate laps around the rink together. 

Maybe she’d be more conflicted, try harder to suppress these feelings, if they weren’t skating so well. But their run throughs feel great. Actually, they feel better than ever - channeling their new physical intimacy, their intense happiness, makes their material feel incredibly authentic. It’s exhilarating. In the few, brief moments during the week when she can take a moment to reflect, she realizes she hadn’t ever considered that a romantic relationship with Scott could actually make their skating stronger, rather than just assuming it would be a negative, a distraction.

... 

On Thursday, the day before competition starts, Tessa and Scott start the day with media. Her anxiety over the Rod Black interview feels miles away. Now, she loves how Scott pulls his chair right up to hers at an angle and gets so close he practically has his legs wrapped around her. She loves feeling his eyes glued to her the whole time she talks. It doesn’t even occur to her to worry what anyone is thinking. It’s not that she wants everyone - or anyone- to know about them. It’s just that she’s so caught up in it, she sort of forgets to worry what other people are thinking. 

On Friday, their short dance is a dream. It feels sharp, clean, extremely fun. Marie-France wears a purple scarf and they laugh together when they see her punch the air in celebration as they take their bows.

On Saturday, the schedule is a mish-mash of women, dance, women, mens, pairs, men. As a result, when Tessa and Scott head to the rink in the morning, there are skaters from all disciplines on the bus.  
As they’re walking down the aisle, Dylan calls out to Scott.  
“Moir - did you see that chick working at the front desk? That girl is mint.” He laughs his idiotic laugh.  
He’s mostly well-meaning, and they’ve known him forever, but Tessa quietly can’t stand him. For at least 10 years, every time she’s seen Dylan, he’s either hit on her (regardless of whether he had a girlfriend at the time or not) or offended her, or both. She finds it even more irritating that he seems to have no idea how obnoxious he is. Considers himself progressive, alive to ‘women’s issues’. Woke bro, as Jordan would say.  
_Not woke_.

Most guys would be smart enough to save this kind of thing for when they were only with other guys, the locker room, etc. Not Dylan.  
Tessa sees Gabby Daleman, who’s sitting a row ahead of him, hear what he says and contort her face in disgust.  
Dylan’s partner Lubov stares out the window, obviously wishing she had no part of this.

Scott laughs a little, dryly, uncomfortably, shakes his head.  
“Nice, Mosco.”

Tessa slides into a window seat several rows back. Scott takes the aisle seat beside her. She quickly slips her headphones in her ears, closes her eyes. She feels rage. The older she gets, the less tolerance she has for this kind of bullshit.

It’s not a long bus ride. A few minutes later, when they’re almost at the arena, she feels Scott discreetly rub her thigh with the tip of his thumb. She opens her eyes, pulls an earbud out.  
“You ok T?” he says in a low voice.  
She looks back at him, blinks.  
“Dyl’s super stupid. We know this,” he says quietly.  
She sighs. Nods a little.  
“Too bad Kirsten’s not on this bus - she probably woulda clocked him,” he continues out the side of his mouth.  
At this, Tessa can’t help but laugh a bit. It’s a pleasing visual. Kirsten and Dylan’s partnership did _not_ end well.  
“I’d pay to see that, actually,” he adds reflectively.  
She laughs again, feels somewhat better. But it bothers her that because Dylan is conventionally good looking, and he gets away with more than he should. It’s gross.  
She sighs again, looks out the window. Imagines what she might have said in the moment to shut him down. 

By the time they get off the bus, she’s mostly put it behind her, ready to focus on the competition. Scott follows closely behind her. As she turns to head into the women’s change room, she glances back at him.  
“You good?” he asks. He’s looking right into her eyes - he’s not just worried about whether she’s ready to compete. He’s worried about her.  
He reaches out and grabs her forearm, gives it a squeeze. Feeling his hand, she feels her blood pressure drop.  
She nods.  
“I am,” she says, barely. There are cameras everywhere.  
“That’s my girl,” he says in a low tone, with an approving tilt of his head. She turns to walk into the change room, and when she looks back once more, he’s still watching her.

Finally, when it's their turn to skate, Tessa is in the zone. Their free feels so _real_ , like they really live in it.  
At the end of the program, she stands up after having been bent back over Scott’s knee in their ending pose. He stays kneeling, reaches out for her hips, and presses his forehead into her.  
“You,” he breathes into her stomach, looks up at her grinning before he stands. 

They sit in the Kiss n’ Cry, catching their breath, waiting for their score. When it finally flashes across the screen, they’re thrilled. Canadian champions again.  
They hug their coaches, and then Scott grabs Tessa, pulls her toward him, and kisses her cheek the way he might otherwise kiss her mouth, or some other part of her, and then nuzzles her necks. She feels a thrill run through her, and she squeezes his arm.  
_This is what I’ll remember_ , she thinks. 

...

The medal ceremonies all happen at once, after all the skating is done, after 10 pm. Tessa is so happy, and exhausted almost to the point of giddiness. She’s in the mood to play fast and loose with the rules.  
She and Scott take their bows, and make a break for the gate to leave the ice. Tessa gives Scott’s hand a squeeze, and she casts a sidelong glance over at him.  
“Whatcha doin’ after?” she murmurs.  
He looks over at her, surprised.  
“Pretty much nothin’?”  
She briefly arches a brow at him.  
“What about ‘The Plan’?”  
“Damn the plan,” she says in a low voice, as she keeps her camera smile plastered on her face.  
“Yes ma’am,” he says. “I’ll come to you later,” he says like he can't quite believe it, as he smiles and waves up into the audience.  
They part ways and head for the dressing rooms.

Back at the hotel, skaters, their families, and various hangers on chat in the lobby for awhile. Tessa excuses herself to go upstairs, and catches Scott’s eye from across the way as turns to leave.

She showers and changes into little shorts and a T shirt, regretting she didn’t pack something cuter to wear. But then - she hadn’t planned to break the rules.  
After she dries her hair, she puts on some music from her phone, picks a slow jam she likes. Mood music.

 _Show me if you want me_  
_If I’m all that_  
_I will be that_  
_I will be your friend_

She’s expecting Scott any minute. Sure enough, a knock on the door.  
She swings it open with a huge grin on her face, which quickly mutates when she sees it’s not Scott. It’s Kaitlyn.

“Hey girl hey!” says Kaitlyn, holding up a 1L jug of chocolate milk. “Thought you might wanna split this and catch up for a bit! You busy?”  
“No! Yeah! Come in!” Tessa squeaks.  
Kaitlyn strolls into the room, heading for the bed.  
“We hardly even got to talk tonight!” she says, as she hops on and tucks her legs up, crossing them.  
Tessa stares at her, her mind blank.  
“What’s this song?” asks Kaitlyn cocking her head, listening. “I like it. Sexy!” She moves her head to the beat a few times.  
“Oh! Ha, just some good ol’ Carly Rae Jepsen, you know…” Tessa reaches for her phone, picks it up. “Maybe I’ll, um…” She hits the forward button and the next song on the album plays.  
_Boy problems, whose got ‘em._  
_I guess that’s more like it_ , Tessa thinks wryly.  
“Ooooh, I like this one too!” says Kaitlyn enthusiastically. Kaitlyn is rarely short on enthusiasm. 

“So how’s it going?” Kaitlyn asks eagerly.  
“Oh yep yeah good!” says Tessa, preoccupied thinking that Scott is going to be scratching at the door any second. “You know what, sorry let me, ah... just let me make a note here...”  
She frantically fiddles with her phone, tries to text Scott, “Kaitlyn’s here. Abort mission!” But in her frenzy, she types: “Kaitlyn’s h. Abort” and hits send before she can fix it.  
“Kaitlyn’s what????????????” Scott types back almost instantly.  
“Her!” Tessa tries again. “Here!”.  
Scott sends one at the same time.  
“she there? Don’t come?”  
“Yes!”  
“Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh,” he writes.  
And then, “k”.  
And then the X-eyed emoji. 

“Sorry,” Tessa tosses her phone and it slides down the dresser.  
She walks to sit across from Kaitlyn on the bed. Gives her head a little shake.  
“Sorry,” she says again. “Such a whirlwind this week. How are things with you?” She reaches over and pats Kaitlyn’s knee.  
“I’m gooooood,” Kaitlyn says. “We’ve hardly seen each other! Since your big comeback and everything.” She says ‘comeback’ in a funny voice, with little jazz hands.

Tessa tries to smile but winces slightly, feels a tad awkward. She knows her and Scott’s return to competition must be hard for Kaitlyn and Andrew, who would very likely have the gold this weekend - and who knows what else- if she and Scott hadn’t been back to claim it.

Although Kaitlyn and Andrew have struggled a bit this season specifically, Tessa feels she’s been trained to doubt them. Marina was forever clucking her tongue when she saw Andrew and Kaitlyn, because Andrew had to hunch over to hold Kaitlyn, bend his arms so much.  
“Not good the lines,” Marina would sniff dismissively.  
Tessa always felt badly because she liked Kaitlyn and Andrew so much, knew how incredibly hard they worked, felt protective of them. But she could privately admit to herself that she could see Marina’s point.

“You’re right, our paths haven’t really crossed!” Tessa says, trying to be careful with her choice of words. Kaitlyn and Andrew didn’t make the Grand Prix Final, so she and Scott didn’t see them in Marseilles. Safest to assume that’s a sore spot. She changes the subject.

“You’re so close to New York now! Lucky you!”  
“Yeah it’s amazing!” Kaitlyn seems genuinely thrilled about this. “We go into the City as much as we can.”  
There’s no doubt in Tessa’s mind that “we” means Kaitlyn and Andrew. They are famously co-dependent. Skating together, working out together, living together, vacationing together. Together together.

Over time, Tessa has had mixed feelings about Kaitlyn and Andrew - not as people, they’re both incredibly sweet - but as a pair. They’ve always been so openly ooey-gooey sweet together, and it’s gotten even more that way over time. Even, until relatively recently, when Tessa had always assumed Andrew was gay and that he and Kaitlyn were best friends, she found their ‘we are one’ thing a bit much to take. Tessa just doesn’t have it in her to be public with her truly personal feelings, and even finds seeing other people putting theirs on display to be off-putting.  
_We’re WASPs, dear_ , her grandmother would say. _We don’t emote_ \- and ‘emote’ was said with considerable disdain.

On the other hand, she knows she’s had moments of jealousy toward them - she can admit that to herself. She cringes when she remembers how the difference between Kaitlyn and Andrew and she and Scott was depicted on their reality show.  
Kaitlyn and Andrew are happy go-lucky soul mates.  
Tessa and Scott are sexually frustrated business partners.  
It was undoubtedly overstated, oversimplified by the show, but then there was certainly also truth in it. At least at the time. Even if Tessa still wouldn’t - now, doesn’t- want a relationship with Scott to be so obvious to anyone and everyone, she has always marvelled at how close Kaitlyn and Andrew genuinely are, how they share their entire lives, whether the cameras are rolling or not. She couldn’t - and can’t- help but admire their unflinching, total dedication to each other. 

“I looooove New York, I’m totally jealous,” Tessa smiles. And she’s not faking it - New York is one of her all time favourite places.  
“Well, Montreal must be pretty great!” returns Kaitlyn. “How are you guys finding it?”  
“Also pretty amazing,” Tessa says, again with no need to exaggerate. Montreal is a fabulous city.  
“Does Scott like it? I could see it not really being his thing as much,” Kaitlyn says thoughtfully. “I mean, you guys are so different.”  
Tessa feels a little hurt, even though she knows Kaitlyn means nothing by it. And 99 out of 100 people who know the Virtue/Moir storyline would say the same. Their blue blood/blue collar dynamic is a major part of their public persona, for better or worse. And there can be no doubt, Scott would be the first to declare himself a country boy at heart.

Tessa waits a beat to answer, stifling her urge to say something defensive.  
“You know, I think he really likes it.” She tries to say this as detachedly as she can, as if she’s talking about a casual acquaintance, like she’s not too sure. Trying to maintain the image Kaitlyn is used to - that Tessa and Scott don’t share many of their feelings with each other.  
But then she says without really meaning to, “He’s grown up a lot, I guess.”  
“Oh!” says Kaitlyn, eyebrows raised. “Do you find he’s more supportive now?” Again, Kaitlyn has every good reason to ask this question - in years gone by, Tessa would sometimes, kind of, confide in Kaitlyn when she was frustrated with Scott.  
“Yeah I really do,” Tessa says quietly, lost in thought for a split second.  
She sees the slightest change in Kaitlyn’s face - recalibrating. 

_She knows_ , Tessa thinks, her heart beating faster. But her heart’s not racing because she doesn’t want Kaitlyn to know. Her heart’s racing because she’s tempted to just say it. Out loud. To Kaitlyn, not the closest friend she has, but someone who might well understand the dynamics at play.  
_Me and Scott. Are. A thing._

But in the next instant, she reverses course. She can’t do it.  
“But we still have a lot of problems,” Tessa blurts. Kaitlyn’s face changes again, surprised.  
“Oh no, do you?”  
“Ahh I mean, you know, not _problems_ , I guess. But just like….., ughhhhhhh, his singing! And he bites his nails!”  
She knows this sounds incredibly stupid - these are not the kind of ‘problems’ world-class athletes would be concerned about in their team mates. But it’s all she can think of.  
Kaitlyn narrows her eyes a little for a second, but then nods understandingly and laughs.  
“Yeah, Andrew picks his nose when he drives. He thinks I don’t notice, but oh boy, do I ever!”

Kaitlyn has such a kind heart. If she found Tessa’s answer weird, or if she’s tempted to ask if something’s going on with Scott, she doesn’t do it. She just plays along, and Tessa is grateful.  
She takes a deep breath, feels herself relax, and suggests they open the chocolate milk. 

...

When Kaitlyn leaves, it’s well past midnight. Tessa retrieves her phone. She has 11 messages from Scott.  
“She still there?”  
“Still?”  
“How about now”  
“Are u guys talking about me”  
“If she says anything mean you better tell me”  
“Still??????”  
“Watching tsn highlights. They showed you about 10x as much as me - no idea why”  
“Should I have her paged to reception? Emergency in the family??”  
“Can’t believe Poje has managed on his own for this long”  
“Nooooooo i;m getting sleepy T”  
“Maybe your asleep?” And finally,  
“Good night.”  
He finishes with the x-eyed emoji, for the second time that day.

Tessa considers going to his room, wistfully imagines climbing into his bed with him. But it’s late enough that they’ll be messes tomorrow for the gala if they start anything now. Plus falling asleep there would be a terrible idea - now she imagines herself trying to sneak around the hotel at the crack of dawn, unseen.  
On top of all that, she’s not 100% sure whether he’s in 316 or 361.  
She sighs, pulls her covers back, and gets into bed. 


	17. Chapter 17

##  January 2017 

###  Scott 

###  On Sunday morning, Scott stands in the hotel lobby chatting with Chiddy, Andrew, and Eric, his usual two water bottles in hand, waiting for the bus to gala practice. Tessa and Kaitlyn get off the elevator, laughing together.  
“You girls have fun last night?” Scott asks as they come toward the group.  
Tessa opens her eyes wider, looking at him hard. It’s only then it hits him he’s probably not supposed to be so obvious about knowing she and Kaitlyn were together.

Kaitlyn, by contrast, flashes a huge grin, apparently delighted by the question.  
“Why, yes we did, Scott!” she responds happily. She comes right up beside Andrew, wraps her arms around his waist. Andrew drapes his arm over her shoulder. “How about you? Get up to anything?” She cocks her head as she looks at Scott, curious.  
Scott feels Tessa watching him still, likely pleading with him telepathically not to say anything in any way implying, well, anything.  
“Not really,” he says simply, quickly gives Tessa a self-satisfied look. _How’s that for discreet_.  
She arches her eyebrow, more placated than impressed.

“Who’s ready to get their gala on?” Dylan says loudly, sauntering over. “I just came from the gym,” he adds, unnecessarily.  
“Well, I guess we’re not as ready as you, then!” Eric says sarcastically, and everyone, including Dylan, laughs.  
“How about Tessa? She looks ready,” Dylan lifts his chin in Tessa’s direction, smirking.  
Scott notices Tessa shrink back slightly after being singled out. He feels his jaw clench. Dylan’s always had a thing for Tessa, but he’s only realizing this week how fucking annoying it is.  
“Tessa? Tessa _loves_ gala practice!” Chiddy chimes in. At this, Tessa bursts into a smile, looking at Chiddy. She loves Chiddy. She doesn’t love Dylan.  
“It’s my faaaaaaavourite,” she drones, rolling her eyes but still smiling. She turns to start walking toward the door, and the others follow. 

But once practice gets going, and Eric starts going through the choreography, the mood is great and it’s obvious even Tessa has fun. She hams it up with Andrew, getting super into the choreography and cracking jokes like a couple of goofballs. 

“Tessa, Tessa, you need to _feel_ the music,” Andrew instructs, biting his lower lip and greatly exaggerating Eric’s latest direction, a step-touch-shoulder-shoulder that would be cheesy even without any extra effort.  
“Oooooh _feel_ the music,” Tessa repeats, as if suddenly understanding, and matches his movements, then throws her head back to laugh.  
Scott observes this from down the line with amusement and a little envy. It's not that he's worried about Tessa running off with Andrew or anything like that. It’s more like he’s used to being the centre of attention - particularly Tessa’s attention.

Eric takes a pause from leading the group through the steps, and everybody takes five. Scott moves toward Tessa and Andrew, as does Kaitlyn.  
“Vanilla Ice called, he wants you guys as back-up dancers,” Scott announces.  
“It’s ok to be jealous,” Andrew sighs. “But you know, if you need a pro tip,” he continues more enthusiastically, starting to move again, “that last part is basically just walking backward on a treadmill…” He demonstrates, and it’s hilarious.  
“Yeah - cause what could be easier than walking backward on a treadmill!” Tessa points out, and they laugh. She and Scott give Andrew’s ‘tip’ a shot. Mercifully, miraculously, no one gets hurt.

Kaitlyn hangs back a little, smiling but looking tired.  
“The three of you have _way_ too much energy today,” she says, shaking her head.  
“Also jealous,” says Andrew curtly, pointing at Kaitlyn.  
Scott nods slowly, coming to a realization.  
“I think sassy Poje is my favourite Poje,” he says reflectively. All four of them laugh again.

Chiddy comes by, and Scott skates off with him for a while. When he looks back across the rink, Tessa’s standing talking to Kaitlyn.  
_I wonder if she told Kaitlyn anything_ , he thinks briefly. He hopes she did. Maybe she’d start to realize it’s not that big of a deal.

When Kaitlyn gets distracted by Andrew, Tessa stands on her own, hands in her pockets. Scott makes his way toward her. He hasn’t had a chance to talk to her one on one yet today. He sees her notice him coming toward her. She smiles, but also gives him a little warning look. Don’t push it. He keeps his arms crossed to show he’s all business.

“You know, Eric’s a little worried you and Poje are trying to take his job,” he says, arching his brow. She grins and he's so pleased to have her focus on him. But then she shakes her head defensively.  
“That’s all Andrew. It’s like he’s been overtaken by the ghost of Richard Simmons,” she pauses. “Except the weird thing is, Richard Simmons is still alive,” she deadpans, wide-eyed.  
Scott bursts out laughing. He gets way too much credit for being the funny one.  
“Virtch, you’re on today!” he says, impressed. “Especially for a gala practice.”  
“I’m still pretty tired like usual,” she smiles, narrows her eyes sleepily, pouts a little.  
“Oh yeah? You girls stay up too late or what?” His voice is low. He can’t help himself. Ice dance partners can share a nice, friendly hug during practice, can't they?  
He circles around her briefly as he reaches out and wraps his arms around her shoulders, pulls her toward him.  
She keeps her hands shoved in her pockets but nestles her head on his shoulder. He hears her make a muffled noise into his neck. A tiny, happy groan.  
God, it’s a good sound.  
He rocks her briefly, then murmurs into her ear.  
“I better get outta here before you take your hands out of your pockets and try to feel me up or something.”  
He hears her guffaw incredulously into his shoulder.  
“You wish,” she mouths as she stands back.  
He presses his lips together and nods decisively at her as he skates away. She’s got that right.

As Scott skates past Kaitlyn, he notices she’s been watching them.  
_Great_ , he thinks happily.

...

In the change room before the gala starts, the TSN camera crew is lurking around.  
“Scott Moir - what’s your shirt say?” the camera guy asks.  
Scott looks down at himself. He hasn’t taken a close look at this shirt, at least since he first got it, or maybe ever.  
_Oh yeah_ , he thinks, reading upside down. _Tessa + Scott_. He laughs to himself. It's a funny thing to forget about.  
“Why don’t you show us,” the camera guy says, training his lens on Scott’s chest.  
“For sure,” Scott says agreeably, trailing his finger over the words. 

...

After their performance of Sorry finishes, Scott clasps Tessa’s hand against his chest as they skate to the boards.  
“I never noticed this shirt had our names on the heart,” he says to her through his heavy breathing. “The TSN guys pointed it out. I think they got a good close up.”  
She laughs, surprised.  
“A close up?!” she squeaks. And then shakes her head, laughing again. “And you don’t remember? That costume was Marie’s idea.”  
He catches her eye just before they step off the ice, shrugs.  
“I like yours better.” He’s always been partial to the sparkly, very short little dress she wears for this program.  
She laughs through her panting, blushes a little, which he of course loves. But she also gives him yet another warning look. He loves that, too.

...

After the gala, Tessa takes Kate out for dinner while Scott keeps a curling date he made several weeks earlier with some old friends he has in Ottawa.  
Afterward, he picks the Virtues up from the restaurant, and they drive Kate to the airport. His own mom didn’t stay for the gala - she needed to take an earlier flight to London to make sure she’d be home in good time to be ready for her early lessons Monday morning. Carol and Cara left with her.  
“I could have taken the same flight as Alma,” Kate says from the backseat. “that would have saved you a trip to the airport. You have a bit a drive ahead of you.”  
“Oh, it’s no problem at all, mum,” says Tessa, glancing back at Kate. “I’m so glad we got to squeeze in a dinner just the two of us.”  
“Me too, honey. And I’m happy I got to see your exhibition again. I just love that Justin Bieber!”  
“You and me both, Kate,” interjects Scott. “I’m a _huge_ belieber.”  
“A what, dear?” asks Kate, confused.  
“Ignore him, mum,” says Tessa, laughing. 

Scott pulls up at the curb, and hops out of the car to grab Kate’s bag from the trunk. Tessa gets out, too, and they both hug Kate good-bye.  
By the time they hit the road for Montreal, it’s already after 8 pm.

...

Scott savours their drive home, laughing and talking in the dark car on the highway. Despite being together pretty well all week, they’ve barely had any time to themselves. 

“Do you think I should get my haircut like K-Rey?” Scott asks.  
Tessa gives him a stern look.  
“Don’t be mean,” she says. Pauses a second. “But 100%, yes you should.”  
Scott laughs.  
“K-Rey’s hair, Poirier’s moustache,” he suggests.  
Tessa laughs hard. It’s a truly insane visual.  
“That ‘stache,” Scott says again, gives his head a shake.  
“I dunno, I think it kinda works?” Tessa says reflectively.  
“Oh yeah? You’re into it?” he’s genuinely interested.  
“Well, I mean. For _him_. For disco, for tango. _Not_ for you, Scott.”  
“We’ll see,” he says, sticking his lip out, mulling it over.  
She just shakes her head and laughs in a way that pretty clearly means ‘don’t even think about it’.  
_Got it. No facial hair_ , he thinks to himself. 

He changes the subject.  
“So... you and Kaitlyn talk about me?” he keeps his tone light, steals a glance at Tessa as he drives.  
She waits a beat before she answers.  
“I think you came up once or twice, yeah,” she says cryptically, smiling a little. He _thinks_ this seems promising.  
“Oh yeah?”  
She looks over at him and smiles again, but doesn’t say anything.  
“All good, I hope?” he tries again. He knows he’s pushing her, but he needs to know if Kaitlyn knows what’s going on.  
“I’d say so,” she says, and then clears her throat.  
“I didn’t, um, tell her though. About us, I mean.”

Now he can feel Tessa’s eyes on him as he watches the road. He’s a little surprised by how disappointed he feels.  
“I did tell her your singing has gotten worse,” she teases him gently. He laughs a little, trying to mask his disappointment.  
Tessa takes a breath.  
“And, um, I told her I think you’ve matured a lot. Cause, you really have,” she continues sincerely, quietly.  
This surprises him, and he glances at her again.  
“And, that I feel like you really support me now, and how it means a lot to me.” 

This isn’t what he was expecting, or what he thought he wanted to hear. But it makes him really happy.  
He reaches over and takes her hand, and they drive for a while without talking.

...

When they finally pull up in front of Tessa’s, it’s after 10 pm. Scott is hoping, praying, Tessa will invite him in. When she doesn’t ask right away, he figures he better make sure she knows he’s ...available.

“Is it too late now to say... “ he sings to the tune of Sorry, taking care to do his best Biebs, but instead of finishing the lyric, he makes his most pathetic, desperate ‘can we pleeeeeaaase have sex’ face.  
She laughs, gives him a look. She knows precisely what he’s getting at.  
“Sorry,” she finishes the line for him, sadly. “But I think it is too late.”  
She pouts as if there’s no choice in the matter.  
“You know as well as me, I can be _so_ fast!” he offers, laying his last shred of dignity bare at her feet.  
She laughs again, pouts again, and shakes her head. But then changes her expression, looks a little impressed.  
“Way to put a positive spin on that whole fast thing, though.”

“Uggghhhhhhh,” Scott throws his head back, pretends to pull a dagger from his heart.  
Then he looks over at her wide-eyed, tries to reason with her.  
“You know, last weekend, we had sex SIX times in 36 hours. A lot of doctors would say a sharp cut back like this is really dangerous.”  
She narrows her eyes, skeptical.  
“I’m sorry, which doctors are these?”  
“Um, like sex doctors. Mostly,” he nods. “Yeah. I don’t make the science, it just is what it is.” 

At this, she laughs happily. Shakes her head at him.  
Leans over the centre console of his car, puts her hand on his leg.  
“There’s always next weekend,” she says in a very low voice, as her face gets close to his.  
He whimpers at the thought - an eternity.  
But then he opens his mouth as she presses hers to his. A good night kiss is definitely better than nothing.

She surprises him with her intensity - not unlike the first time they kissed at his parents'. He leans back a little as she pushes toward him. He feels her hand tighten and relax on his thigh, kneading him like a cat. The best and worst kind of torture.

He manages to get his hands up under her jacket - that little short puffy parka she wears. He pulls her toward him with one hand, paws at her with the other. Feels her nipple through her shirt. He’s pretty sure he hasn’t felt this painfully desperate since he was 16.

Then she pulls back, breathing hard and smiling.  
“Good night,” she whispers, with one more quick kiss, right beside his mouth.

“Ughh,” he whines, grimacing, feeling profoundly sorry for himself. “Can you call me an Uber? I can’t drive.”  
She laughs as she opens the car door.  
“You’ll be just fine. See you in the morning. And oh yeah - great work this week!”


	18. Chapter 18

## January 2017/ February 2017

###  Scott 

###  “How was shopping?” Scott asks, glancing up at Tessa. It’s sunday evening. She’d showed up at his place 10 minutes earlier for dinner, toting several pink shopping bags. Now she sits at the island bar in his kitchen, watching him chop vegetables. 

“Good!” she says eagerly. “I got some great black jeans. And you know what they say - if you’re not wearing black jeans, are you actually even in Montreal?”  
He laughs a little, scanning his brain to see if he can make sense of this joke. Nope.  
His laughter peters out and they blink at each other.

"You haven’t noticed how young people dress here? Hipsters? Black jeans? Blundstones? Ironic glasses? Grunge? The Concordia _look_?!” she asks him incredulously.  
Clothes are not his thing. He tries to make sense of the words coming out of her mouth.  
“Uh, what stones?”  
She laughs, shakes her head. Something tells him she didn’t actually expect him to understand.  
“Stick with me. I’ll keep you current,” she says confidently.  
“Always happy to stick with you, T,” he says.

Scott looks down and continues chopping.  
“Anything on next weekend?”  
Tessa thinks for a minute.  
“I’ve got that yoga class I like on Sunday. I think that’s it.” She pauses. “Well, and I mean, the Super Bowl,” she rolls her eyes as she laughs.  
He laughs, too. Then he stops chopping, looks up at her, grinning. 

“Come home with me! For the grand opening.”

She looks taken off-guard. She swallows. Not the reaction he was expecting.  
“Scott, that’s your thing with Paul. If I’m there, it’ll be all about us.” 

They look at each other. He realizes he’d assumed she’d say yes, that she was just waiting to be invited.  
He shakes his head, shrugs.  
“Paul won’t mind. Paul loves you!”  
She chuckles uncomfortably, gives him a look that suggests he should think about this for a minute.  
“ _Cara_ might mind,” Tessa says, gently but firmly. “It sounds like she’s put a ton of work into this. I don’t think you can spring me on her now.” 

Scott picks up a carrot from the chopping block, munches it while he thinks for a second.  
“She does go a little crazy with the planning,” he allows.  
But he doesn’t feel convinced. He feels disappointed.  
Pops another carrot in his mouth. 

Maybe sensing his change in mood, Tessa gets up from her stool, walks around the counter, stands behind him and wraps her arms around his waist.  
In a matter of seconds, he forgets everything. 

He drops the knife, stretches his arms back, clasps his hands behind her, pressing the front of her into the back of him. He feels her face smush against his shoulder blade, feels her giggling.

“Ok, wise guy, you do the chopping,” he orders.  
She laughs, un-laces her arms from his waist and fumbles for the knife. She can’t see anything from behind him.  
“This seems pretty dangerous!” she warns, laughing, as her hand happens by chance on to the handle of the knife.  
“Don’t worry, I’ll let you know if the blade gets too close to my... Special Area,” he tells her.  
“Haha! I’m not sure I could live with myself if I damaged your… Special Area,” she mimics his phrasing.

In one fluid movement, he unclasps his hands from behind her back, gingerly takes the knife from her and lays it on the board, and turns around to face her, pulling her into him again, but front to front this time. 

“Oh good!” he says happily. “My Special Area is quite fond of you, too.”  
She scrunches up her face, laughing and grimacing at the same time.  
“Gross.”  
“Hey now,” he furrows his brow. “My Special Area would never say that about you.”  
This sends her into a fit of laughter, but she still winces at the term.  
“In fact, my Special Area is a super big fan of your Special Area,” he continues indignantly.  
“Stop,” she pleads through her laughter. “Please. Stop saying Special Area. I’ll do anything if you stop.” 

He looks at her wide-eyed.  
Then, without another moment’s hesitation, he bends and hoists her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, makes a beeline for his bedroom.

By the time he lays her on his bed, she’s barely breathing, she’s laughing so hard.  
He pauses to look at her, grins at her rolling around, holding her stomach.  
But then he lowers himself over her, nuzzles his face in the crook of her neck.  
Hears her laughter get slower, breathier.  
“Anything?” he whispers into her ear.  
“Within reason,” she whispers back, still laughing.  
“I can totally work with that,” he pushes himself back to standing, tugs his shirt over his head and chucks it across the room.  
Leaps back onto the bed, and onto Tessa.

...

Scott steps back into his sweat pants, and saunters to the kitchen to resume his meal prep.  
Tessa appears two minutes later, wearing nothing but the T-shirt he’d cast off earlier.  
Her hair is still in the high ponytail it was in when she arrived, but it’s a little wispier and mussed up from the sex they just had.  
Scott stops what he’s doing, watches her walk toward him.  
“Is this a Montreal look too? Cause this one I like.”  
She laughs, blushes. So cute.  
“Oh yeah! You haven’t noticed that either? People here either wear black jeans or just no pants at all,” she replies with a wave of her hand.  
“God, what a great city,” he says, shaking his head.

After they eat, they cozy up on the couch and watch some of the NHL All-Star game.  
“I guess I should get changed,” Tessa sighs after awhile. She starts to get up off the couch.  
“I better supervise,” Scott says, following closely behind. “You might try to steal that shirt.” .

When they get to his room, he comes right in behind her and grabs her around the waist with one arm, lifts the shirt off over her head with the other.  
He holds her, naked, against him and starts walking her back toward his bed. He’s mostly expecting her to stop him, tell him it’s too late. But she doesn’t. They fuck again, and as usual, it’s fantastic.

Afterward, they lie tangled on top of the covers for a while. Talking a little, but mostly just lying together.  
Tessa leans her forehead against Scott’s, runs her thumb over his ear.  
“I better get home,” she says softly.  
He’s not ready to let her go. He pulls her close to him. 

‘The plan’ is all fine and good, except that it makes sunday nights awful. Sunday nights when they’re going to be apart the following weekend even worse.

She lets him hold her a bit longer, but then says very quietly, “Scott.”  
He feels sick. But what choice does he have? He lets her go.

...

Mid-week at the rink, they stand in the concourse overlooking the ice, stretching. 

“I hear they changed the Bungalow burger,” Scott announces nonchalantly, referring to Tessa’s all-time favourite London meal.  
Tessa whips around to look at him.  
“What?! Where did you hear that?!”  
Scott laughs in amazement.  
“Whoa - your head just did that thing from the Exorcist!”  
She ignores this, opens her eyes wider, nods to urge him on - _out with it_!  
Scott laughs again, shakes his head defensively.  
“Charlie said he ordered it and thought it tasted different. He wasn’t sure you’d want them saying it was your favourite on their menu anymore…” He shrugs a little, looking at her like, don’t shoot the messenger. But definitely amused by how horrified she is.  
“When?! When was this!” She demands.  
“He mentioned it on the weekend. But look, I mean, he could be wrong,” Scott says reassuringly. Stands up straight and turns to face her, palms up. Offering a solution.  
“Hey - ok, just come home with me this weekend, we’ll go straight to Bungalow and get to the bottom of this.”

For maybe a split second she looks to be considering this - obviously she takes this turkey burger _extremely_ seriously. But then her face changes, she kind of laughs and gives him a ‘nice try’ look.  
Turns back to her stretching.

She hasn’t technically said no yet, so he tries one last time. He comes to stand beside her at the railing, putting his foot up to do the same stretch she’s doing.

“Don’t you wanna meet the baby?” he asks, looking out over the ice. He tries to keep his tone light, but he can’t quite bring himself to look at her. He feels desperation taking hold of him.  
“Oh, Cruzz?” Tessa asks innocently, saying it like it rhymes with fuzz, calling back to Scott’s misunderstanding about the baby’s name when he first was born.

Now that she’s on to what Scott’s up to, she’s not letting him get away with it as easily.  
He laughs, but even he can hear that it sounds forced. It feels forced.  
He’s getting the sinking feeling she really isn’t going to be persuaded. 

Tessa pushes out of her stretch, and turns to face him.  
“Of course I want to meet him,” she says sincerely, quietly.

The soft way she says this makes it clear they're not joking around anymore. She's trying to let him down gently now. The last thing he wants.  
He forces himself to meet her eye.  
Why the hell won’t she come with him?

“But my parents aren’t expecting me home this weekend, so they might wonder-” she stops herself before she can complete the thought.  
She looks at him helplessly, as if he’s asking her to do something completely insane, as if he’s put in her in an impossible position.  
He finishes for her in his head- _they might wonder if you came cause of me_.  
Neither of them need to say it outloud.  
He knows he’s right, and it feels like shit.

They stand in strained silence for what feels like five minutes.  
Scott gives in first.  
That’s it. She’s actually not coming. Fuck.  
He studies the ground for a minute.  
“Should we hit the gym, T?”  
He turns and starts walking to get his stuff before she can answer.

...

Scott flies to London Friday around lunchtime. Since his last effort to get Tessa to come with him, he didn’t bother to mention it again.  
She didn’t mention it again either, but he felt like she was being a little too delicate with him, like he was fragile or something.  
He doesn’t want her to feel bad. He wants her to want to come with him.  
He’d barely said goodbye to her when he left the rink that morning.

A few rows up, a couple walk down the aisle to their seats, pausing to kiss before the girl moves to take the spot by the window and the guy reaches to put their bags in the overhead bin.  
Scott watches them, scowling.  
_Jesus, you’re only going to be apart for two seconds! Pass me the air sick bag._

He realizes that if Tessa was here, he could have said that out loud and she would have laughed. But then, if Tessa was here, he wouldn’t have wanted to say it in the first place. He wouldn’t be a bitter person traveling alone.

He frowns out the window of the plane, balls up his hoodie against the wall, and closes his eyes, trying to sleep. But instead of sleeping, he stews.  
She knows the shop is a huge deal for him. Can she actually be _that_ freaked about people thinking they _might_ be together that she wouldn’t make an effort to be there for something so important?  
He’d never miss something like this of hers if he could be there.  
_If she'd even want me there._

...

That evening, Scott does some last minute organizing at the shop with Paul and Carol, Cara and Andy, and his parents. Things are looking great, and he feels proud of what they’ve done. 

Being busy is good, and being away from things that remind him of Tessa is good. He’s feeling better than he has in a few days.

When they’re all satisfied they’re in decent shape for the grand opening the next day, he gets ready to leave, to go meet his buddies at the King Ed in Ilderton for beers. He’s looking forward to it. He pulls out his phone and sees a Twitter notification. A Tessa tweet.

“So proud of you @ScottMoir! Your generosity and sense of community never cease to amaze me. Happy grand opening (& happy dancing) :)”

He looks at it for a moment, feels his stomach drop.  
_Yeah, I bet._

Cara’s looking at her phone, too.  
“Aww! Tessa posted a really nice tweet about the shop! She’s such a sweetheart!”  
Cara looks over at Scott, and the others’ eyes follow hers, all seeming interested in Scott’s reaction.  
“Uh, yeah, I saw,” he mumbles. “Anyway, looking really good in here - I’m excited. I’m gonna get going, see you guys tomorrow.”

...

The next morning, Scott wakes up around 7. He’s feeling pretty good. Seeing his crew the night before was great, and it boosted his spirits a lot. Helped him take his mind off of Tessa for a while - a very welcome reprieve.

He heads for the bathroom, and looks at his phone as he sits on the toilet.  
He remembers Tessa’s tweet, reads it again. It seems different today - sweet and sincere-, and he feels like an ass for being annoyed by it the night before. And for ignoring it. He taps out a response.

“honestly...just a glimpse of the support I receive everyday from the best partner in the world! Virtch you rock”

But when he reads it over once more before he posts it, his eyes stall on ‘best partner in the world.’ He definitely means it, but at the same time, thinking about it too much starts to make him feel bad again.  
He sighs, hits send, gets in the shower. Whatever.

...

The shop is only open for three hours on its first day, and it’s busy the whole time. But it’s not quite the distraction he’d hoped for. Every other customer asks:  
\- Where’s Tessa?  
\- What’s Tessa doing?  
\- How’s Tessa?  
And worst of all,  
\- How come Tessa’s not here?  
Every time, he winces and forces himself to smile, giving pleasant but vague answers.  
It feels like taking a bullet every time.

...

Alma and Joe host a big party at their house in the evening to celebrate the opening.  
Scott makes sure to get in some time with his grandpa - GMac.  
GMac is probably his favourite person on the planet, if not very closely tied with... someone else he’s trying not to think about. 

GMac loves to tell stories, and Scott loves to hear them. Even when he’s heard them many, many times before, which is more and more the case as GMac approaches his 90th birthday. 

This evening, GMac seems intent on talking about Scott’s grandma, who died when Scott was a kid.  
“Now you may not have known my Jean,” GMac says. “But, my, she was quite something, quite something.”  
“I remember her, GMac,” Scott says, nodding.  
“Well, when I met Jean,” he starts. Scott’s heard versions of this story before, but he listens carefully nevertheless. “She was at the Ilderton dance there, down at the, uh,...that place, you know. Edgar was her name then. Jean Edgar. And the legs on that woman, let me tell you!”  
“GMac!” Scott laughs. “You dog!”  
GMac grins, laughs wheezily.  
“Oh you woulda liked those legs, alright!”  
Scott laughs again.  
“Well, I dunno, GMac. My own grandmother’s legs?”  
GMac just laughs, shakes his head. It’s not clear whether he doesn’t remember that Jean was Scott’s grandma, or that he doesn’t think it matters, but either way, he presses on.

“But my God - the way that woman danced,” GMac shakes his head again, but wistfully this time. “I remember as soon as we started dancing together, we just - fit. Like nothing else. It was...quite something.”  
GMac trails off.  
Scott feels his chest tighten. He knows all too well about dancing with his perfect fit. 

Scott’s cousin Leanne comes to join them in the next moment, carrying baby Cruz and with her own toddler in tow behind her.  
Scott is grateful for the change in topic of conversation. He smiles, watching GMac light up when he sees the little kids.  
“I guess we should be calling you GGMac now!” Scott says, gently clapping his grandpa on the back. “You’ve got so many great-grandkids!”  
“You know, I’m a great-grandfather!” declares GMac happily, smiling as if he’s only now realized it. 

“Scott, why don’t you take Cruz so GMac can have a visit with him,” Leanne says.  
“Hand ‘im over,” Scott says agreeably. He’s had enough nieces and nephews and cousins to be a decently confident baby-handler.  
He tucks sleeping Cruz in the crook of his arm.  
“Whadda they call this one again?” GMac peers at Scott, and then looks down into the bundle in his arms.  
“CRUZ,” Scott enunciates loudly for GMac’s benefit, trying to push the thought of saying “Cruzz” out of his mind. Only Tessa would get that.

Charlie’s daughter Quinn appears, having come up from playing in the basement. Her brother Shea is in hot pursuit. Quinn marches up to Scott, stands on her tiptoes to get a peek at the baby.  
“So, Q, what do you think of your new brother?” Scott asks her.  
She looks up at him, somewhat stricken.  
“He’s another boy,” she says, as if this will give Scott all the information he needs to understand her feelings on the matter.  
He stifles a laugh.  
“What’s wrong with boys? I’m a boy. Shea’s a boy. GMac’s a boy. Your dad’s a boy. Boys are awesome.”  
She shrugs, entirely unpersuaded.

“Where’s that lady? That slept here.”  
Scott feels his face fall. The hits just keep on coming.  
“Tessa?” he squeaks.  
Quinn just looks at him, waiting.  
Out the corner of his eye, he can see Alma at the kitchen table, filling bowls with chips. He knows she’s listening.  
“She’s, uh, in Montreal.”  
“Is she coming later?”  
“Uh, don’t think so, Q.”  
Quinn shrugs again, wanders off.  
Scott stands, looking for someone to hand the baby off to. He needs a drink, immediately.

...

Later, when some of the older folks have gone home and gone to bed, the younger set picks up the pace. 

Scott’s buddies stand around, going in and out of the back patio door to smoke cigarettes (for some) and joints (for others). Alma and Joe stocked the party with a truly impressive quantity of liquor, and it’s not going to waste. 

After a few beers, Scott is emboldened enough that he’s living up to his age-old reputation - Life of the Party. His facial expressions become more exaggerated, his ‘rural’ Ontario accent gets more pronounced (‘are’ becomes ‘er’, ‘for’ becomes ‘fer’, ‘your’ becomes ‘yer’). He shares anecdotes that require animated physical demonstrations - hopping on one foot, pretending to get knocked over, throwing punches, and, - of course - dancing.

By now, even his most staunch bachelor friends have girlfriends, or at least girls they’re dating seriously enough that they brought them to the party. And some of those girls brought friends with them.

One such friend is Kyla (or is it Kaila? Kaia?). She’s petite - not much taller than 5 feet. Younger. Scott vaguely remembers her as the little sister of someone he knew growing up. Pretty, sort of sporty. Poker straight, shiny, shoulder-length hair. Good teeth. Nice tits. She fits squarely within his historical ‘type’.

It occurs to him at some point that she’s sticking close by, laughing at his jokes, making eyes at him over the rim of her beer cup. Putting out vibes. Getting this attention from her is the ego boost he’s been craving, without even realizing it. 

When he goes to the kitchen to get another beer, he stands up from bending over the cooler and realizes she’s followed him.

“Hi!” she giggles. Shakes her empty red cup.  
“Hi,” he says, a little surprised. Pleasantly surprised. “Getcha beer, or?”  
“Yeah, for sure,” she giggles again. “Maybe, umm, can you pour it for me? Cause of the head and everything,” she holds out her cup to him.  
He swears she’s undressing him with her eyes.  
He blinks at her. Head?  
“You know, like, the foam? I’m not great at pouring.” She smiles.  
“Oh! Yeah, yeah,” he grabs the cup from her, cracks the beer. “So, you’re Ryan Craig’s sister, right?”  
“Uh, yeah,” she rolls her eyes, giggles.  
“How’s ol’ Ry doin’?”  
“Uh, good, I guess,” she giggles again. “He’s not, like, an Olympian or anything.” She gives him a look.  
Scott laughs a little, finds himself giving her a once-over.

“And, uh, what about you? What are you up to these days?”  
“Um, I work at Bizzy Bees? The daycare,” and giggles, nods. “And I do Pampered Chef. I’m actually the #3 consultant in Ilderton right now.”  
“Oh nice,” says Scott. He vaguely knows she’s talking about kitchen stuff. “Sounds like you’re a busy bee.” He knows it’s cheesy, but a joke’s a joke.  
“Oh, um, no I _work_ at Bizzy Bees,” she corrects him, obviously missing the point. Maybe ‘humour’ isn’t her thing.  
But then she smiles again, tilts her head and - did she just lick her lips?  
“So, um, do you come home very often?”

 _She thinks I’m single_ , he thinks.  
_Wait -_ am _I single?_  
Before he can think this through further, he answers her absentmindedly.  
“We don’t get the chance very often,” he says.  
“We?” she asks, eyebrows up.

He looks at her, evaluating. She’s no soulmate, but she would fuck him - he knows it. He could fuck her. If he wanted to.  
But Tessa. Tessa. Tessa. Tessa. Tessa.  
This girl can’t hold a god damned candle to Tessa.  
It’s so fucking annoying.

“Tessa,” he says plainly. “Me and Tessa. We.”  
Oddly, it feels both liberating to say it, and like a defeat. Like he’s giving into something he should be trying to resist.  
“Oh,” she says. “Well, um, ok. Thanks for the beer,” she turns on her heel and leaves the kitchen.

Scott pounds his beer, pours another. Soon, he’s feeling drunker, and darker. Frustrated by how incredibly _bad_ he’s got it for Tessa. Despondent because he’s convinced himself it’s not mutual.  
He drinks way too much, to numb himself.

...

He wakes up in his childhood bed the next morning, feeling awful.  
Hideously hungover.  
Lays like a corpse, staring at the ceiling.

Other than himself the last two nights, Tessa was the last person to sleep here. He swears he can smell her, even though more likely than not, Alma has washed the sheets since then. Maybe he’s imagining it, torturing himself.

The magical night she spent here seems like eons ago, even though it’s only been a little more than a month.  
He thinks bitterly of how ecstatic he was that night, how simple it all seemed.  
_Never should have kissed her_ , he thinks bleakly. _Never_.  
Couldn’t be more different than he feels now. The chasm between joy and despair.

...

He gets back to Montreal sunday evening. Exhausted. Still very hungover.  
Thoroughly bummed.  
He flops on the couch. Suckles a bottle of PowerAde for the electrolytes. Puts on SportsNet but doesn’t really absorb anything.

He hears a knock. He’s not expecting Tessa, but he knows instantly it’s her.  
Gets up slowly and trudges toward the door.  
When he opens it, she’s there, beaming at him.  
“You’re back!” she exclaims, but in a small voice.  
He looks at her standing on his stoop. He hates that he can’t help but feel happy to see her. He wants to keep feeling bad. Feels he's earned it. 

She moves to him, wraps her arms around his neck.  
“I missed you,” she whispers right up against his ear.  
Before he can stop himself, he instinctively folds his arms around her waist and hugs her back. Picks her up off the ground, pivots, puts her down so he can close the door to the cold air.

Turns to face her, but doesn’t look up right away. When he looks directly at her, it weakens his resolve to feel hurt. She’s so beautiful, it’s an unfair advantage.

“You up for hanging out for a bit?” she asks, her voice even tinier. She sounds nervous.  
Then he feels even worse for making her feel bad, looks up at her finally.  
“Yeah,” he says. It’s all he can manage.

They sit side by side on the couch, watching - or at least, looking at - the TV. Tessa’s hands are clasped together, pressed between her knees. She still has her coat on.

They sit like that for quite a while, in silence. Scott is taken by surprise when Tessa starts talking.

“You know, um, I’m still figuring this out. You said when we got back after Christmas that you thought there had been something between us for years. I think that, too. I’ve always thought that. But I never knew you did,” she pauses, takes a breath. “Until then.”

He stares straight ahead and stays stock still. Afraid that if he moves, she’ll clam up.  
This is already the most she’s ever said about her feelings for him.

“Really, I’ve spent most of my life kind of, I guess - or as long as I can remember, anyway!- , following you around, wanting you to… like me. In one way or another.” He can hear that she smiles a little at this. 

“You said it yourself- it was like a switch turned on for you, like, out of nowhere, and you just, I guess, realized you felt... that way, about me.” She pauses briefly. 

“So your switch went on all of a sudden, and now we’re ...doing this?” She lets the question hang in the air for a second.

“I don’t mean it in a bad or, like, accusing way, or anything like that, but.. It is kind of like you just decided that this - us - would be a good idea - and I’m so happy - but I guess I feel like I’m still ... getting used to the feeling that you… want me, like that.”

She pauses again. He swears he can hear her heart beating through her coat. His might not be beating at all.

“A lot of the time it still doesn’t quite feel real to me, I guess. Maybe I’m still trying to trust it.” She says this very quietly. 

But then, for the first time since she started talking, turns her head toward him. Reaches toward him but lets her fingers fall on the couch just beside his leg.

“I know it’s hard for you, but I still need time before I can just let this be a regular normal we’re-dating-now thing. I don’t like it either - honestly. But that’s just me.”

Scott is stunned. 

He’s spent all weekend feeling wounded, and is now struck by the realization maybe he’s the one who’s been a dick. Selfish.

He hadn’t really considered _why_ Tessa might be holding back, except to assume that she was embarrassed by him, or... something? But...did he really think he embarrassed her? Suddenly, that makes no sense.  
All he’d really been able to think was that he wasn’t getting his way and it sucked.

He might throw up. He starts breathing loudly, nodding slowly.  
“Ok,” he chokes out. “I’m an idiot.”

“Oh god, no no,” Tessa says, shaking her head. “Or at least, if you’re an idiot, so am I.” She laughs dryly. “I’m so, _so_ bad at this. I literally spent the _entire_ weekend freaking out about how to tell you that.”

He can see from the corner of his eye that she’s still shaking her head, shrugging, like, Can you believe what a loser I am?  
“Well, and hoping you’d let me tell you. Thanks for answering the door, by the way.”

He makes himself turn his head and look at her. It almost makes him cry to see her beautiful face watching him expectantly, after what she just told him.  
He’s been such an asshole. He basically punished her for trying to protect herself. 

He reaches over and hugs her as hard as he can. Breathes her in.  
Hears her giggle, maybe cause he’s squeezing her so hard, or maybe cause she’s just happy.  
_I love you._  
_I love you._  
_I love you_ , he thinks with every part of himself.  
But he doesn’t say it. He needs to be a lot more careful.


	19. Chapter 19

##  February 2017 

###  Tessa 

###  A few weeks into February, Tessa and Scott travel to Korea for Four Continents. 

Since their conversation the previous weekend, Tessa senses Scott being so careful with her. He hangs on her every word. He protectively puts his hand on the small of her back. Insists on carrying her stuff. She constantly feels his eyes on her.  
It’s almost like he’s trying to make sure she recovers from an injury. One he seems to think he caused. 

She never meant to make him feel he did anything wrong - she only wanted him to understand why she needs more time. 

...

After their flight from Vancouver to Seoul reaches cruising altitude, Scott leans across the armrest and into Tessa’s shoulder. She looks up at him from her book, and sees he’s holding one of his ear buds out to her. The other one’s in his own ear.

She smiles, pops it in to listen.  
Hears a twangy cover of You Make My Dreams.

“Oh!” she exclaims when she recognizes it.  
Tessa LOVES Hall & Oates. Scott HATES them, but he’s a country fan. This is probably the only way he would even consider listening to them. 

She looks over at him excitedly, a little amazed he’d listen to any version of this song.  
His eyes are closed - apparently trying to sleep.  
But she sees his lips curl up at the corners when he hears her reaction.

...

They arrive in PyeongChang very early local time Monday morning, a little ahead of pretty well everyone else. It’ll afford them an extra chance to skate in the Gangneung Arena, and to give them a head start on tackling their jetlag. The first hint of daylight is just peeking over the horizon when they get off the plane.

The hotel is huge. There are hundreds of rooms. It’s fancy, but not in a good way. It’s gauche.  
Marble! Columns! Fussy valances! Overwrought Louis XIV furniture! Everything! Is! Over! The! Top!

Tessa cringes slightly to herself looking around. She can only imagine what Kate would say.

“Wow, nice place,” whistles Scott sincerely, taking his own look around the massive lobby.  
Tessa smiles at him, and to herself. Sometimes she almost envies him his lack of interest in anything aesthetic. It makes things simpler for him. 

After depositing their stuff in their rooms, they meet back in the lobby to find breakfast. An employee directs them to an enormous, (tacky) posh, completely empty hotel restaurant on an upper floor. It’s barely 7 a.m.

From the restaurant, they can see how close the hotel is to the beach. The view is truly sensational, especially with the sun starting to rise over the water. It more than makes up for the decor inside.

A hostess greets them very eagerly. Maybe she recognizes them, but then, maybe it’s just that the place is completely empty and she’s happy to have something to do. She leads them to a table by a window.

They sit, and a server in a formal uniform appears and places menus in front of Tessa, and then Scott.  
“English,” he says, opening the flap and gesturing to the right.  
Tessa smiles up at him.  
“Thank you!”  
The server nods, and then disappears. 

“How’d he know we don’t read Korean?” Scott asks under his breath, frowning sarcastically.  
Tessa chuckles, tongue between her teeth.  
“We’re the only people here, and I still feel underdressed,” she glances down at her puffy silver ski jacket, leggings, runners. 

“Hey!” Scott says suddenly, looking at Tessa wide-eyed. “We’ve got this nice place to ourselves. This can be our Valentine’s day!”

Tessa, totally taken by surprise, feels her jaw drop open. What a sweet suggestion! She hadn’t given Valentine’s day much thought - they need to focus on the competition-, but, at any rate, the real day tomorrow will be busy busy. And, as ever, she much prefers the privacy they have now over whatever they’ll have then.

But before she can say anything, Scott clarifies.  
“Well, part of our Valentine’s Day,” his face changes instantly from innocent to lascivious, wiggling his eyebrows at her.  
“You were almost adorable for a second,” she shakes her head in mock disappointment, laughs again.  
“Ok, I’ll be good,” he shrugs, actually looking slightly sheepish. 

He lifts his water glass.  
“To my Valentine,” he says gallantly.  
She can’t help herself - she blushes. Lifts her glass, clinks it against his. 

But then she shrieks.  
“No!” Her hand shoots across the table. “Don’t put your glass down without drinking after you cheers! It’s bad luck!” 

Scott stares at her for a second, mouth open, glass in hand, frozen in mid-air. Then he rolls his eyes, but obliges her by taking a sip of water.  
“Jeez. She may be my Valentine, but she’s a little bit nuts,” he says out the side of his mouth to their non-existent breakfast companions.  
She groans, but laughs in spite of herself. 

Scott glances at his menu, but closes it quickly.  
“I think I’ll have the poached eggs, in honour of my Valentine,” he says, batting his eyelashes at her. Pushing her buttons.  
“And I think I’ll have the knuckle sandwich in honour of mine,” she says wryly.  
Scott throws his head back, laughing.

“Oh burn!” he yips, delighted. “You really think you could take me in a fight, Virtch?”  
“Depends what kind of fight,” she shrugs.  
“But wait,” he holds his chin pensively. “If _you_ have the knuckle sandwich, doesn’t that mean I have to punch you?”  
She laughs again, rolls her eyes.  
“Couldn’t let me have that one, eh?”  
“Ok, I’m sorry, Tess,” he says in an ingratiating, conciliatory tone. “You can punch me.”  
He reaches across the table and covers her hand with his, pats it condescendingly.

She closes her eyes, lets out a long loud breath through her nose. Pretending to be far more exasperated with him than she actually is.  
“I may take you up on that.”  
Again, he laughs heartily. Gives her hand a squeeze. 

...

After they finish eating, Scott points to a foot bridge down below the hotel, leading toward the water. They don’t have too long before they need to get to the arena, but they agree they have time to go check it out.

By now, it’s a gorgeous sunny day, unseasonably warm for an early morning in February. The scenery is breathtaking - white sand and turquoise water aren’t what most people expect of Winter Olympic host cities. 

The day, the setting, having a little adventure together just the two of them - it almost doesn’t seem real. It’s worth remembering.

Tessa tugs on Scott’s sleeve as they walk across the bridge.  
“Wait - should we take a picture?”  
“Yeah,” he says happily. He takes Tessa’s phone from her and hooks his arm around her, pulling her toward him.  
Holds the phone out, with the water behind them.

When they make it to the beach, they wander around for a few minutes. Taking it in.  
The beach, like the hotel restaurant, is deserted.

Tessa pauses, pulls out her phone and takes a moment to examine the selfie they took on the bridge, sliding her sunglasses up to get a good look at it.  
Scott comes up behind her and looks over her shoulder.  
“Great photographer,” he says, sounding impressed.  
She chuckles and gives him a look.  
“Nah, it’s really nice,” he says sincerely.  
She smiles down at it for another second, feeling sentimental.

She slips her phone back into her jacket pocket, and reaches down for Scott’s wrists. Pulls his arms around her waist.  
“Oooooh,” he coos, surprised. “This is nice,” he murmurs right against her ear.  
He holds onto her snugly. She rests back against him, stares out over the water.  
Thinks for a minute.

“In a year, this beach will be packed with people,” she says softly, imagining this serene, beautiful place in the throes of Olympic chaos.  
“So much could happen by then. But it’s going to come so fast.”

She feels Scott tighten his grip on her, but he doesn’t say anything.  
He just presses his cheek against hers.

...

Back at the hotel, they grab their gear and are whisked away in the back of a pristine SUV driven by a hotel driver, hurtling along the coast toward Gangneung Arena. When the competition gets going, there will be shuttle busses to ferry skaters and coaches back and forth, but that won’t start til tomorrow. 

On the ride there, they’re each glued to their respective windows trying to drink in PyeongChang as best they can.  
Tessa feels Scott inch his hand toward hers on the car seat and slip his thumb inside the cuff of her jacket sleeve.

When they arrive, they make a point of taking in the giant, brand new arena from every possible angle - outside and inside - as best they can. Trying to commit it to memory.

At ice level, Tessa hangs back a second, watching Scott rest his elbows on the boards and look out across the rink and the stands and up at the scoreboard hanging from the ceiling.

He’s got a big backpack on, and even though she can barely see from behind him, she just knows he’s got a giant goofy grin on his face.  
Her heart swells - he can still be so childlike sometimes. And she’s so grateful that he’s as excited as she is.

She comes to stand beside him, smiles over at him, hesitant to disrupt the moment he’s having. But wanting to be part of it.

He turns his head and beams at her.  
“This is it, T,” he whispers, in awe. “This is where it’s all gonna go down.”

But then his grin fades, and they stare at each other. 

Suddenly, the excited little kid she saw a moment earlier morphs into the man she has dedicated almost her whole life to, and who holds her heart in his hands. 

This is where they may - or may not - stand on top of another Olympic podium.  
This is where their real career together is going to end.  
This is where everything is going to change forever.  
They only have a year.

She feels a lump in her throat. She tears her eyes away from his, looks up at nothing in particular. Needing to pull back from him for a second.  
But Scott doesn’t look away. He keeps watching her.

...

By Friday night, they have another win under their belts. Their undefeated season continues. 

It wasn’t flawless - Scott slipped in the short, a near miss. But he didn’t fall, and it wasn’t on an element. It didn’t have much of an effect on their score, but it rattled him.  
Afterward, he stood with Patrice, nodding gravely. Patch didn’t seem too fussed - it was almost like he was spending time on it because he could tell Scott wanted him to. Like Scott expected - or thought he deserved - a stern talking to.

Tessa stood beside them, also nodding, but not really listening. Watching Scott. Wishing he wouldn’t be so hard on himself. She could just as easily have made a mistake.

...

On Saturday morning, the only official item on the program for ice dance is the small medal ceremony. 

As it’s rare to get the chance to not be in workout clothes for one of these events, Tessa takes the opportunity and goes a little fashion-forward with her outfit choice: off-the-shoulder top, high-waisted zipper pants, wedge boots. All black everything. 

As she stands at her hotel bathroom mirror, hurrying to pull her hair up into a high bun, she realizes she should let Scott know she’s not going to be wearing sweats and runners for this one. She absentmindedly grabs her phone, types out a text while she holds four bobby pins in her mouth.

“Hey! What are you wearing?” Not her usual elegantly composed text, but she’s in a rush.  
He responds a minute later.  
“Tessa please this is sexual harassment”. 

She laughs to herself, realizing his interpretation of her message isn’t actually that unreasonable.  
“Haha I mean im wearing regular clothes. Regular/nice. FYI”.  
“K well mine are VERY nice. FYI”. 

She reads his text as she grabs her jacket and purse. Laughs again. Not overly optimistic about what he’s chosen to wear, but happy he’s in a goofy mood. He was too hard on himself this week.

In the hotel lobby, she’s pleased to see that a) he’s on time, and b) he really does look nice. A blazer, a button down… with dark jeans? And new shoes?? _Nice_ shoes??? 

She opens her mouth to compliment him, but just then the Shibutanis and Madi and Evan approach them, so she stops short. The fact that all four Americans are wearing their team fleece zip up sweaters only serves to underscore how put-together Scott looks.

...

Later that day, Tessa and Scott meet up with Andrew and Kaitlyn to watch pairs.  
Tessa has Kaitlyn on one side of her, and Andrew on the other. Scott’s sitting on the far side of Andrew. 

“So…. how was your Valentine’s day?” Kaitlyn asks Tessa in a hushed, almost conspiratorial, tone.  
Tessa flinches slightly. She came so close to telling Kaitlyn at Nationals about Scott, but she couldn’t quite do it. 

Tessa’s mind flashes back to Monday morning, laughing over breakfast with Scott. The feeling of his arms wrapped around her on the beach. Exploring the Olympic venue together.  
And then on Tuesday, at practice, how he’d slipped his arms under her jacket for their pre-skate hug, and whispered ‘Hi, Valentine’ into her ear.

Willing her face not to turn red, Tessa makes herself shrug casually.  
“Um, fine! You know, I mean, practice, whatever.” If she is going to talk to Kaitlyn about this, it’s not going to be here. Tessa hurries on.  
“How was yours?”  
Now Kaitlyn beams.  
“Oh, good!” she steals a little look past Tessa, at Andrew. 

Tessa glances quickly over her shoulder at Andrew, but he’s not listening to them. He’s deeply embroiled in a serious discussion with Scott about whether the Leafs will make the playoffs. 

“We walked to that little exotic bird sanctuary down the beach from the hotel,” Kaitlyn continues.  
Tessa nods, doesn’t bother to clarify whether ‘we’ refers to Andrew. There can be no doubt.  
“Oh! And actually, I’ve decided the peacock is my spirit animal,” Kaitlyn tips her head up dramatically.  
“Good one! I can totally see it - you’re both very regal creatures,” Tessa laughs. “What’s Andrew’s?” 

The longer she can keep Kaitlyn talking about Andrew, the less likely the conversation will steer back to Scott.  
“Hmmm,” Kaitlyn frowns, leaning over to get a better angle on Andrew. “I mean, I think it’s giraffe, right?” 

Andrew suddenly becomes aware that Kaitlyn and Tessa are both studying him, and he turns to look at them.  
“Yes?”  
“Wow, I think you’ve got it!” Tessa giggles, genuinely impressed with Kaitlyn’s insight. Andrew’s big brown eyes, lanky features, and natural gentleness are a very good fit for giraffe. 

“Got what?” Andrew furrows his brow.  
“Your spirit animal. You’re a giraffe!” Kaitlyn tells him happily.  
His brow does not unfurrow.  
“A giraffe? That’s not very… badass,” Andrew says skeptically.  
“Well, if the shoe fits…” Kaitlyn says, laughing.  
Andrew pretends to be annoyed, reaches across Tessa and bops Kaitlyn on the knee playfully. Kaitlyn, still laughing, tries to turn the other way in her seat to avoid him, but doesn’t quite make it.

“Now, Scott…” Kaitlyn says as her laughter slows, and leans even further forward to get a look at him. Scott, who has apparently tuned in at some point, sits up straighter and gives her his noblest profile. 

“Raccoon?” Kaitlyn says after thinking for a minute.  
“What?!” Scott squawks.  
Clearly, he’d been expecting something like bear, or possibly, lion.

“Well, you’re very quick and expressive!” Kaitlyn says defensively. “And I’m sorry, i’m just channeling the spirits. It’s not up to me!”  
Tessa laughs hard, seeing how perturbed Scott is. She can’t deny - Kaitlyn’s on to something.

Scott looks at Andrew for back up.  
“Don’t listen to her, man,” Andrew shakes his head stoically.  
Scott raises his eyebrows expectantly at Tessa, who’s still laughing.  
“Well, you do have some raccoon-like … tendencies,” she winces apologetically.  
“What?!” Scott squawks again. 

“Ok, Tessa!” Tessa stops laughing as Kaitlyn turns her focus to her. Kaitlyn twists in her seat to get a good look at Tessa’s face.  
Tessa smiles, suddenly feeling self-conscious.  
“Ugh. It’s going to be something cool,” Scott says, disgusted.  
“I know!” says Kaitlyn. “Panther!” nodding as she keeps looking at Tessa. 

“Tessa gets panther, I get raccoon. This is ridiculous. We don’t have to take this from them, Poje.” Scott stands up, supposedly in a huff. Andrew follows suit.

But before they leave their seats, he turns, sighs a big exaggerated sigh.  
“Would the panther and the peacock like anything?”  
He says it sarcastically, but Tessa can see he’s loving this. Plus the fact that he knows Kaitlyn’s is a peacock makes it pretty clear he was paying more attention to their conversation than he initially let on.

...

After the gala on Sunday afternoon, Tessa, Kaitlyn, Madison Chock and Madison Hubbell sit around a corner of one of the women’s change rooms, taking their skates off. 

Madi C. looks up suddenly.  
“Oh! I have Ev’s phone. He’s probably looking for it. Be right back,” she dashes out of the room.

Kaitlyn watches her go.  
“So those two are together now, hey?” she asks happily to no one in particular. “They’re so cute!”

“Yep. Another one bites the dust,” says Madi H. dryly, under her breath, but certainly loud enough to be heard. 

Even though they both train at Gadbois, Tessa and Madi don’t know each other that well. They’re friendly, but they’re not close. Despite that, Tessa admires Madi - she’s not warm and fuzzy, but she’s whip smart, witty. Extremely hard working. Very talented.

Madi and Zach dated for a while when they first started skating together, and but it didn’t last. Now they each date one half of the Spanish team, Olivia and Adria, who also train at Gadbois. Tessa has watched the four of them together, sort of amazed by how well they all seem to get along. They spend a lot of time together as a foursome. It’s a little mystifying as an outsider, but it seems to work for them.

All of that notwithstanding, or maybe because of it, Madi seems to have strong opinions about dance partners dating. 

Tessa glances at Kaitlyn to see how she takes Madison’s comment. Kaitlyn and Andrew aren’t “official” as a couple publically, but close enough. Madi must know they’re together. 

There can be no doubt - Madi and Kaitlyn are very different people. Madi is cool, Kaitlyn is peppy. And on top of that, they both came up in the US ice dance world - a few years apart, but close enough to be competitive with each other for a long time. There’s a lot of history there.

Kaitlyn purses her lips a little. Pessimism is not her style, and pessimistic comments about love are _definitely_ not her style. She sniffs.  
“You know, I just need to ask Andrew something,” Kaitlyn stands, and leaves the room.  
This leaves Tessa and Madi alone. They fuss with their stuff in silence for a few moments. But then Madi sits up and looks at Tessa.

“You and Scott are together now, too, right?” 

She says it simply, not unkindly.  
But it’s certainly a very direct, _very_ unexpected question.

Tessa is dumbstruck, totally taken off guard. She opens her mouth but nothing comes out. She closes it again, swallows.  
“Mmm hmm,” Madi nods slowly, knowingly.  
There’s no use in Tessa saying anything. Madi clearly knows she guessed right. She turns back to putting her skates away.

Finally Tessa manages to croak a word.  
“How…?”  
Did Scott say something? To Zach maybe?

Madi sits up again and gives her a look like, c’mon.  
“I see you every day,” she says plainly. But again it’s not unkind, it’s just honest.

So people - or Madi anyway - can tell there’s something going on without being told. This thought swirls around in Tessa’s head. She’s tried to be so careful. 

“Look, I know it can be tricky. But Zachary and I went through the whole thing and we...survived,” she smiles, maybe slightly bitterly. “If you ever want to talk, you know I’m around.” 

Tessa feels her thudding heart slow a little. She manages to nod. She’s not totally sure why, but she trusts Madi. Maybe even more than she’d trust Kaitlyn, who she knows a lot better.  
“Ok,” she barely whispers. “Thanks.”

Just then, the other Madi bustles back into the room.  
“So! What are you guys wearing to the banquet?” she asks happily.

...

A few hours later, Tessa again finds herself peering into her hotel bathroom mirror, this time getting ready for the banquet that night. She sees her phone light up.

“Can I pick you up on my way?”  
She smiles at her phone. The banquet is being held in on the second floor of the hotel, so there’s not far to go. It’s very sweet of Scott to offer to escort her.  
“That would be great :)” she responds.

Fifteen minutes later, she hears him knock softly at the door. She steps out into the hall.  
She blushes, watching Scott look her up and down.

“Wow,” he says, his voice low. “The panther.”

This makes her laugh. She looks up at him, and then notices how great he looks.  
“Wow, I mean - you, too,” she manages, looking from his crisp white shirt to his skinny black tie to his nice new shoes. She’s seen the suit before, but it looks like it fits him better. Has he discovered… tailoring? 

Suddenly, he’s bashful. It’s completely adorable.  
“Yeah, I asked Liam what the cool kids are wearing these days,” he says, looking down at himself. “Thought I could stand to step up my game a little.”  
With this, he looks her in the eye. She can see how much he wants to impress her. It’s heart wrenching.  
“You look great,” she whispers.

He grins.  
“Shall we?” 

“Uh, hold on just a sec,” Tessa says. Reaching up to tuck her hair behind her ear, even though it’s all pulled into a sleek pony.  
“I, um… Madi knows about us,” she says quietly. “Hubbell. Madi Hubbell.” 

Scott is obviously surprised.  
“You told her?” he asks. It breaks Tessa’s heart a little that he sounds hopeful when he says this.  
She shakes her head slowly.  
“No, I guess she just, I think… figured it out.”

She watches Scott’s eyes cast around, searching for the right thing to say. Finally, he looks at her, straight on.  
“Are you ok?” he asks.  
She looks back at him, so touched that this was the first thing he thought of. He doesn’t share her concern about people knowing about them.  
“Yeah,” she nods, looking in his eyes. “Thanks for asking.”

They to walk to the elevator. He puts his hand around her waist until a door opens up ahead. Hearing it, he quickly removes his hand, slips it in his pocket.

...

At the banquet, Tessa drinks a glass of red wine. She feels it warm her up, make her giggle. She keeps an eye on Scott, still not quite believing how great he looks. Not quite believing how sweet he is. Feeling her cheeks flush pink when their eyes meet across a group of people.

After dinner, a series of long winded, dry speeches start. Tessa’s mind wanders. She finds herself thinking what a great boyfriend Scott would make. Or, what a great boyfriend he...is?

As if he reads her mind, she feels his shoe press up against hers under the table.  
His little bit of footsy is all the encouragement she needs. She goes for it.  
She wants him to know she can’t stop thinking about him.

She sneaks her hand up onto his leg, hidden by the table cloth.  
Delicately runs her fingertips along the inseam of his pants.  
She hears him very quietly draw a sharp breath. 

She keeps doing it, and he starts jiggling his leg, and then clears his throat.  
She smiles to herself. She must admit, she loves getting a rise out of him. 

But then he grabs her hand and presses it into the top of his leg, so she can’t keep zipping it dangerously along his inner thigh anymore.  
She glances at him and he gives her the funniest look, obviously thrilled, but also stern - a playful warning. 

He holds her hand there until the speech ends a minute or two later.  
Just before he lets go so they can stand up, he gives it a squeeze.

Skaters mill around, talking, waiting for the music to start.  
Tessa feels Scott discreetly press a few fingers into the small of her back, guiding her.  
He nods at a few people and exchanges pleasantries as they weave their way out of the room. 

They approach the big bank of elevators, somewhat camouflaged in a group of Japanese officials retiring early from the party.  
Scott nods at them. Tessa smiles. The officials nod and smile in return. 

On the elevator, Scott reaches around Tessa, and hits the button for his floor. When the doors open, he wishes the others good night and steers Tessa out into the hall, down toward his room. Stops at his door, swipes his key across the lock.

Tessa giggles softly. At this point, it’s abundantly clear what he has in mind. It’s against their rules, but she couldn’t care less.  
He swings the door open for her and she steps inside, grinning. 

Inside the room, she’s about to turn to face him, eyebrow cocked suggestively, when he surprises her by grabbing her waist from behind and walking her forward a few steps.  
He grabs her wrists and presses her hands into the wall.  
His message is clear. _Leave them there._

He runs his hands over her, and presses himself into her, kisses her neck. Breathing like an animal into her ear.  
Her giggling slows, gets breathy. It all feels so, so good.

He reaches down and starts working her dress up over her hips - the dress is fitted and it’s not easy, but it’s safe to say he’s determined. 

When he’s got it, he pulls away from her briefly. She hears a little clatter and a zip - his belt and his fly.  
When he pushes up against her again, she feels the smooth skin of his very erect penis on her bum cheek. She arches her back, pressing into him, aching for him.

He tugs her undies out of the way, and then pushes into her.  
“Ahhhhhhhh,” she gasps.  
He growls into her ear.  
“Is this what you wanted, Tessa?”  


She loves that he can be so sweet with her, so thoughtful, but that he can also be like this.  
_This is what I wanted_ , she thinks. 

"Yes," she breathes.


	20. Chapter 20

##  March 2017 

###  Scott 

###  Scott stands at Tessa’s door, waiting for her to answer. It’s 8:45 a.m. on Wednesday morning. The last relatively warm day before a cold snap is due to hit. He re-adjusts his backpack, kicks his rolling suitcase impatiently.  
He purposely came a little early so they’d have a few minutes alone together.

“Hey!” she swings the door open, smiling. He smiles back, momentarily dazzled by the way her green eyes catch the daylight.  
“Ready for camp?!” he asks sarcastically, but not unhappily.  
“Not exactly,” she laughs, steps aside to let him in.

He closes the door behind himself, shrugs off his backpack. Watches Tessa as she beetles around from her bedroom to the bathroom, back to the main living area where he’s standing.  
“Sorry,” she says when she comes back into the room. “I’m still packing!”  
This surprises him a bit, cause she’s normally so organized. But he hardly cares.  
She bends and tucks something into one of her bags. 

When she next passes him, she asks over her shoulder whether he’d like a cup of coffee.  
“They’re not supposed to be here for, like, 10 minutes,” she says. He follows her into the kitchen.  
“Yeah, I’ll take some coffee if you have,” he replies.  
She reaches up into a cupboard for a mug. Fills it from the carafe, switches off the coffee maker. 

But when he reaches out to take the mug from her hand, she pulls it back toward herself, and then hides it behind her back, grinning devilishly at him. She’s holding his coffee ransom.  
His heart skips a beat.  
He’s tried to be more careful lately, to follow the rules they agreed to, and that she seems to rely on.  
He tries to not be the one who breaks them.  
But he’s all for it when she does.

“Excuse me, that’s my coffee?” he murmurs, backing her into the corner. He grabs the edge of the countertop on either side of her, trapping her.  
She laughs and turns her face up toward him.

He bends his head to kiss her, but just as their lips touch, they hear honking down on the street, and stop.

Scott contorts his face, cheated out of what was about to be a very nice moment.  
“Since when are Europeans early for stuff?” he asks incredulously.  
Tessa laughs, grabs his wrists to let herself out of the little prison he caught her in.  
“Maybe Danish people are punctual like Swiss People?” she suggests. And then teases him. “And _you_ were early today - that was pretty out of character.”  
He shrugs ruefully (she’s got a point), sighs, releases her.

She hustles to collect the last of her things, slips into her coat, pulls on her shoes.  
Ushers Scott out the door so she can lock up.  
He carries most of their stuff down to the waiting car. 

They’re hitching a ride to Kingston with their training mates, Nikolaj and Laurence. Some of Gadbois, plus a few other Montreal skaters, are meeting up in Kingston with Cricket Club skaters, for a get together being called Worlds Camp. Kingston is the halfway point between Montreal and Toronto, so it was the obvious place to gather.  
The idea is to give everyone going to Worlds a chance to run some drills, skate on unfamiliar ice, pal around, before Helsinki in a few weeks. 

Scott opens the car’s hatch and looks doubtful, not sure Nik’s Honda Fit is quite up to carrying four figure skaters worth of gear, plus four figure skaters.  
Nik must sense Scott’s hesitation, because he hops out of the driver’s seat.  
“Hey man,” Nik reaches out for a quick high five, which Scott returns. “Hi Tessa,” he nods across the car. 

“Think we can do this?” Scott asks, looking from the trunk of the car, to the bags at his feet.  
“Of course! In Denmark, we get so much stuff into tiny cars,” Nik says confidently. 

In the end, though, getting everything in the back just isn’t going to happen, and Tessa and Scott have Tessa’s overnight duffle bag on the middle seat between them. 

“Hi!” Laurence twists around from the front seat when Scott gets in.  
“Hey Lolo,” Scott says, buckling himself in. “Are you ready for an epic road trip?”  
She thinks for a second, then nods.  
“Yes,” she smiles. 

By now, Nik has retaken the driver’s seat.  
“Did you get directions in Google, babe?” he asks Laurence, hesitating with his hand on the gear shift.  
“Oh yeah. I will now,” she says. 

Neither Nik nor Laurence speak English as a first language, but he doesn’t _really_ speak French and she doesn’t _really_ speak Danish, so they live their lives together in English. 

“Whoo! Road trip!” hoots Scott, as they pull into traffic. Tessa giggles.  
“I’m so happy we can go together,” says Laurence, glancing into the back seat again. “If you told me like five years ago I’ll be driving with you, I would have freaked.”  
“Oh my gosh, we’re so happy we get to ride with you guys!” Tessa replies enthusiastically. 

Scott just smiles, nods eagerly. Tessa has an innate ability to be gracious, to handle those sort of “you are my heroes” compliments very nicely without tacitly accepting them as fact.  
He has learned to follow her lead on these ones. 

“Baby, am I going on Decarie? Or?” Nik asks Laurence, sounding slightly impatient.  
“Yes,” she replies.  
“You’re sure? Did you look in Google, babe?” he presses her.  
“I am sure. But I will check,” she says, calmly again. Fiddles with her phone. “Yes, Decarie.”

Scott watches this, slightly puzzled - isn’t Laurence from Montreal? Her directions to get out of the city must be pretty reliable.  
But then - giving Nik the benefit of the doubt - maybe she has a bad sense of direction.

By the time they’re out of Montreal, the conversation has turned to whether Laurence can get Danish citizenship, so that they can compete in the Olympics. Not just PyeongChang - any Olympics. Ever.

“It seems like it can’t happen, at least for 2018,” says Laurence sadly. “We’re trying, though. We’re hoping if Worlds result this year is good, that will help.”  
“That must be so hard,” says Tessa sympathetically. “I can’t even imagine how frustrating that would be.”

Scott looks out the window, nodding gravely. It’s a nightmare scenario for a competitive athlete: when no amount of training or success can change laws and regulations holding you back.

“Of course, if she marries me, that will help, too,” adds Nik. “Right, baby?” he says more quietly, glancing at Laurence.  
Scott sees Laurence look back at Nik, lips pressed together. Saying nothing.  
This must be something they've discussed before, but haven’t agreed on.  
The car gets quiet, and it’s uncomfortable.

“So, have either of you been to Kingston before?” Tessa asks quickly, changing the subject.  
_Good work, T_ , thinks Scott.

...

They arrive in Kingston just before lunchtime, and go straight to the K-rock Centre.  
Scott and Tessa walk into the arena together, while Laurence and Nik hang back at the car for a few minutes.  
Tessa takes a quick peek over her shoulder as she and Scott walk away, making sure there’s some distance between them and Nik and Laurence.

“I always thought they looked like Belle and Gaston,” she says to him quietly. “Now I _really_ see it.”  
“Whaddya mean, baby?” Scott elbows her gently, mimicking Nik. “Babe?”  
Tessa gives him an emphatic look that means some mix of ‘exactly’ and ‘if you ever start calling me that, I will end you.’

“But yeah, definitely some Beauty and the Beast vibes, hey?” Scott gets serious, grimaces a little, making sure to show Tessa he also disapproves.  
Laurence is so sweet, and it’s pretty obvious now: Nik is kind of a dick to her.  
It’s clear Tessa takes a very dim view of this. And Scott does too.

...

The afternoon is super fun - warm-up games, skating skill drills, group choreography practice for no real purpose (everyone jokes about the end-of-camp recital they’re putting on for their parents, which of course, isn’t actually happening). Tomorrow will be the more serious stuff - program run throughs, simulations. But today really is like camp. Good fun.

During a break, Scott spots Tessa up in the stands, taking selfies and laughing with Olivia. Olivia’s quite a bit younger, but she and Tessa seem to hit it off. Scott may not know fashion, but he knows enough to know that Olivia is cool - there’s just something about her. And she’s really nice. And (he has no problem acknowledging) she’s really pretty. She’s a good fit for Tessa.

“Ok! Let’s get started again!” Brian Orser calls from centre ice.  
Tessa and Olivia laugh as they decide to hold hands to come back down the bleacher stairs together in their skates - there’s no railing to hold on to.  
As Scott watches them, he realizes pretty much everyone else is watching them, too.

...

When the formal program wraps up for the day, the mood in the locker room is boisterous. 

From here, everyone will go check into the hotel, and then out for dinner as a group. They’ll be back on the ice at 8 am the next morning, but this being one of the few times for a big group of them to be away together, staying in the same hotel, but not at a competition, it’s almost like being on a show tour. It’s reasonable to expect there will be a little party after dinner.  
Plus, real Worlds is a few weeks away, and this is a last chance for a little fun before the real buckling down starts.

“Has anyone figured out the closest LCBO?” Dylan asks the group. “We should hit it before the dinner, or we’ll be sorry later.”  
“LCB...O?” asks Cha Jun-hwan, wide-eyed. The adorable, 15 year old Brian Orser protege clearly has no idea what Dylan is talking about, and looks terrified.  
“Do not worry, it’s just the liquor store,” Lubov explains to him gently.  
But Cha’s eyes only get wider with the clarification - apparently ‘just the liquor store’ is no comfort to him.

“Dylan Moscovitch, ladies and gentlemen - our elder statesman and role model!” quips Scott.  
“Hey, he may be the oldest one,” chimes in Javi, “but he is NOT the mature one!”  
Everyone laughs, including Dylan, who also throws his hands up defensively.  
“You’ll all thank me later when everything’s closed!”

After further discussion, the group reaches the consensus that Dylan’s suggestion wasn't actually that stupid, and Julianne and Charlie offer to stop on their way to the hotel to pick up some beer and a few bottles of wine. 

Scott shoves two crumpled $20’s into Charlie’s hand, and then gestures over to Dylan.  
“Hey Mosco, you better give these kids some money. This was your brilliant idea.”  
“True that,” says Dylan, sauntering over and pulling his wallet from his back pocket. A few others follow suit and add to the pot. 

“Actually, maybe a bottle of tequila wouldn’t hurt,” Dylan says as he walks back toward his stuff. “Little Cuervo to get the festivities going? Right? Ladies?”  
He smiles, or maybe leers, over at Gabby, Gabi, and Tessa, who are all standing in the same vicinity.  
The women glance at each other, _not_ intrigued.

Scott interjects, shaking his head.  
“It’s a school night, Mosco. No hard stuff.”  
“K dad,” Dylan scoffs, making a show of rolling his eyes, pretending to be annoyed, but clearly knowing Scott is right. 

Everyone seems to love the banter, and as ever, Scott doesn’t mind being the centre of attention, or at least part of it.  
Even more so when he catches Tessa’s eye, and she shoots him a tiny wink. 

...

Checking in at the hotel, Tracy Wilson oversees the room assignments. Unlike real competitions, couples are allowed to room together. Or at least, couples that are actually prepared to admit they’re couples can room together. 

Rooming with Tessa would have been Scott’s first choice, but he carefully refrains from even joking about that. He gets to room with Javi, though, and that’s a solid alternative.  
Javi is the man. 

Strolling toward the elevators, Scott siddles up beside Tessa and nudges her gently.

“Who’d ya get?” he asks her, and then deadpans quickly in a low voice, “Please tell me it’s not Dylan.”  
Tessa laughs, and then makes a mortified face at the thought. And then gives him a funny smile.  
“Gabriella.”  
“Oooh,” replies Scott, a little surprised. 

They both really like Gabi - she’s hilarious -but they’ve noticed she’s been a little cooler, a little more distant with them since the Grand Prix circuit, especially as compared to how she’d been when they first came to Gadbois.  
But they know full well - Andrew and Kaitlyn aren’t the only ones whose chances are directly impacted by the Virtue Moir comeback. 

“It’ll be fine,” Tessa says quietly, shrugging slightly.  
Scott gives her another little nudge of encouragement as they get on the elevator.

...

An hour and half later, the group take their seats at three long tables in a cozy nook of an Italian restaurant near the harbour.

Tessa sits across from Madi, at a table otherwise made up of coaches. Scott nabs the seat that’s back to back with Tessa’s, and beside Dylan, across from Javier Raya and kitty-corner from Olivia and Zach. 

After everyone has ordered, Dylan twists backward in his seat.  
“Hey Tessa, you’re a fashion girl. Did you hear I’m doing some modelling?”  
Tessa and Scott both turn to look at him at the same time.  
“Oh! That’s... really cool, Dylan,” Tesa says kindly. More kindly than he deserves.  
“Yeah I’m probably going to be signing with B & M,” he boasts.  
“Oh, um, that’s great,” she smiles and nods. 

As Dylan is saying this, Tracy and Brian make their way to the front of the room to address the group.  
Scott sees his chance to take a little wind out of Dylan's sails.  
“Hey Zoolander, pipe down,” he hisses loudly at Dylan, and everyone who overhears him laughs.  
As everyone turns their attention to Tracy and Brian, Scott realizes Madi is watching him.

...

After dinner, the group loiters at the front of the restaurant, waiting to head back to the hotel.

“Oooh! Let’s get a Gadbois couples pic!” calls Olivia happily. She grabs Zach’s hand, pulling him toward her, and Madi and Adri, Nik and Lolo, Marie-Jade and Romain all crowd around. 

Scott glances at Tessa and she hangs back, watching, with a blank smile on her face, so he does the same. Shoves his hands in his pockets. 

But then Madi - still intertwined with Adri for the picture - looks from Scott, to Tessa, and back.  
“Hey, you know what, let’s do one with all the Gadbois dancers!” she says, and starts motioning them over. “Tessa! Scott, c’mon! Get in the picture.”

Scott hops to, grinning, puts his hands on Tessa’s shoulders and pushes her into the photo. But then he catches a glimpse of her face, he sees she’s flushed pink - is she happy to be included? Or feeling self-conscious? He hopes he hasn’t over-stepped himself.

Gabby takes the photo, and as she starts to hand Olivia’s phone back, Marie-Jade looks around.  
“Oh, we forgot! Gabi et Guillaume!” she exclaims.

Madi looks slightly sheepish - clearly she hadn’t even thought of them. She was just trying to find a discreet way to include Scott and Tessa. Which from Scott's perspective was very nice of her. But he has no idea what Tessa thinks.

...

Back at the hotel, pretty much everyone gathers in Dylan and Guillaume’s room, crammed into every available space. There are skaters splayed across the two king size beds, perched on the long countertop, sitting in the rolling desk chairs and cross-legged on the floor, leaning against the wall. 

Guillaume is maybe the more reluctant host, but he happened to be assigned to share a room with Dylan, so he doesn’t have much choice.

"Should we play a game?" Lubov asks the group.  
“Spin the bottle!” yells Dylan, hoisting his beer.  
“No!” say five or six people at once.  
“Ok, ok, ok,” says Dylan, smiling, nodding confidently. “Truth or dare.”  
A bunch of people groan, but no one shuts him down as definitively.  
“You do know you’re in your _thirties_ ,” says Madi incredulously. Dylan waves her away.  
“I’ll go first,” he presses on. “Dare. Dare me.”

After a few moments of uncomfortable shifting throughout the room, Gabi steps up to the plate.  
“I dare you to switch shirts with me.” 

Several people burst out laughing. Dylan is wearing a loose (for him) T shirt. Gabi is wearing a fitted (even on her tiny frame) women’s workout tank top in pale pink.  
Dylan looks momentarily horrified, but then quickly shrugs stoically.  
“Dare’s a dare,” and he whips his shirt off over his head. When his face reappears from the inverted head hole, he’s beaming. 

“Oh Jeez,” drones Zach. “Look at him. He was just looking for a reason to get naked.”  
Dylan shrugs again, grinning impishly.  
“Hey, I doubt I was the only one waiting for me to get naked.”  
At this, the eye rolling through the room is almost audible.

A moment later, Gabi emerges from the bathroom, practically drowning in Dylan’s T shirt, and holds her little tank top out to him.  
“You’re sure you don’t mind if this thing gets stretched? Cause, ha, I can stay like this if you prefer,” he says.  
“Put it on,” she orders firmly. 

He barely squeezes his way into it, and ultimately, it’s so tight, he needs the assistance of a few people to roll it down his torso. He looks preposterous, standing in the middle of the room, stuffed like a sausage into Lululemon casing, but luxuriating in the attention.  
“If I inhale too hard, I’m going to blow this thing to smithereens,” he gasps.  
Everyone keeps laughing. 

“Ok, I’ll go next!” declares Olivia when things finally quiet down a bit. “Dare!”  
“So brave,” mouths Laurence, eyes wide, looking amazed.

To this point, Scott has mostly been leaning back, nursing his beer, enjoying the spectacle. But then it occurs to him Tessa is probably squirming. Sure enough, he looks over at her where she’s sitting beside Olivia on the bed, and she's smiling but he knows the look in her eyes - she’s really wishing she could burrow through the floor to escape.  
Hopefully she can avoid being dragged into this before it inevitably falls apart.

“I know one!” declares Javi. “I dare you to call the front desk and ask for a - how you say? Like for the toilet?”- he makes a plunging motion with his hands,- “oh! Plunger! To Brian Orser’s room, and say it is an emergency.”  
Again, everyone bursts out laughing - it’s a pretty funny suggestion.  
Olivia clasps her stomach and bends over, laughing in anticipated embarrassment. 

“But won’t they know what room I’m calling from? And I don’t know his room number!”  
“Is beside me and Scott,” says Javi happily, shrugging. “Is 311. Oh, and you have to pretend to be him. Brian.”  
Olivia squeals with laughter again, then gives her head a firm shake, resolved to do it.  
“In for a penny, in for a pound,” she says, determined, British stiff upper lip on full display. 

She picks up the receiver on the bedside table, clears her throat. Drops her voice an octave or two. The room is silent, all eyes on her. She reaches out and dials O for reception.

“Hullo. This is, erm, Brian Orser” - at this point, nearly everyone in the room loses it, and a few people shove their faces into pillows or clamp their hands over their mouths to keep from laughing out loud.  
Adding to the hilarity, Olivia has a hard time dropping her English accent, so she sounds even more absurd than she otherwise would.  
Whoever she sounds like, it’s _not_ Brian Orser.

“I seem to be having a… situation. Can you please send a plunger to room-” here, she stammers, momentarily forgetting the number.

“311!!!!” hisses Javi, waving his arms like his life depends on it.  
“311!” she finishes. “As soon as possible. It’s quite… urgent. Thank you, and good night.”  
She slams the receiver down, and flops back on the bed, gasping for air in a fit of a laughter, as everyone else erupts, too.  
The image of poor Brian opening the door to a harried bellhop looking for a clogged toilet is too much. 

Olivia’s head lands in Tessa’s lap. Tessa looks down at her, laughing just as much as everyone else, seeming to have momentarily forgotten to be uncomfortable.  
Olivia takes a few deep breaths as her laughter slows, and looks up at Tessa, upside down.

“Ok, you Tess! Truth or dare?”

“Ummmm…” Tessa swallows, turning red. Scott briefly considers interceding, offering to take it for her, but he’s not totally sure she’d like that either, so he holds back. “Uh, truth?” she squeaks. 

“Who is Moir boning?” Dylan calls across the room in his tiny pink top, guffawing like an idiot.  
Several people turn and give Dylan admonishing looks.  
“Jesus, Dylan!” spits Madi, disgusted. 

Scott watches a look of terror flash across Tessa’s face, and then remembers himself and reaches over and gives Dylan’s shoulder a good shove. 

“What, your mom didn’t tell ya?” Scott is very well versed in this kind of banter so he brushes it off easily.  
But he’s annoyed that Dylan would say that to Tessa, and in front of a bunch of people.  
Dylan tries to look grossed out but mostly just laughs, knowing full well that he’d get the reaction he got. 

“No! Ok, a real one,” says Olivia, getting down to business. “What was the last date you went on?!”  
By now, Olivia has turned on to her stomach and looks expectantly up at Tessa, like they’re at a sleepover with a few other girls, and not in a room full of colleagues and competitors. Although Tessa and Olivia hit it off in some ways, Olivia’s devil-may-care confidence is maybe not such a good fit with Tessa’s deeply private nature. At least, not at the moment.

Even Scott feels paralyzed by this one, realizing he has no idea what she’s going to say. It’s extremely unlikely she’s going to say “Scott Moir.” And he has no idea who the last person before him she dated was. Or when.

“Ummmmm, Ju- Julien?” she says shyly. Glances at Guillaume. Doesn’t look at Scott.

Olivia watches her a moment longer, waiting hopefully for some juicy details. But then seems to realize none are coming, and that maybe Tessa is actually hating this.  
She pats Tessa’s knee.  
“Very good. Ok, who next!” she asks the room happily. 

Scott, meanwhile, feels like he’s been punched in the stomach.  
Julien. Julien. Who the fuck is this motherfucker. 

Some tiny part of his brain knows he’s being crazy, unreasonable, irrational - it could have been a year ago! - but he feels his blood boil. Before he can stop himself, he puts his beer down and leaves the room.

He goes to his and Javi’s room, paces around. Mind reeling. Tessa dated some asshole named JULIEN and she didn’t even tell him.  
What. The. Fuck. 

Suddenly, he realizes there’s a little knock on the door. He swings it open absentmindedly. Maybe he shouldn’t be, but he’s surprised to see Tessa standing there.  
“Can I come in?” she asks.

Hearing her voice, seeing her, he snaps back to reality. Mostly.  
“Yeah. Yeah of course,” he steps aside, shakes his head.  
She comes into the room, turns back to look at him. He’s now unsure whether to be mad at her, or protective of her, or… he’s not sure.

“Julien is Guillaume’s friend. Man purse?” she says quickly. “We literally just went out that one time - at Grand Prix Final. With Guillaume! It was _barely_ a date. I just - I was caught off guard, and I didn’t know what else to say.” She winces slightly. “I’m really sorry if I… If you didn’t like that.” 

Scott closes his eyes. Exhales. Of course. That hadn’t even occurred to him. He totally overreacted. 

But then, he doesn’t feel as relieved as maybe he should. Actually, he feels even more uneasy.  
It’s just another reminder how complicated everything has to be all the time. The half truths, and full on lies, they need to tell people in order to keep this to themselves.  
He doesn’t mean to be hard on her, but he has to ask.

“What did you tell everybody? When you left to come find me.” He watches her wearily as he waits for her answer.

She’s taken aback for a second, looks slightly confused, at first.  
“Laurence said she needed to check something, so I said I’d go with her. Then I told her I needed to grab something from my room.” Her voice gets quieter as she recounts it, and by the end, she almost whispers.  
Evidently, she doesn’t like repeating the lie, even if it's just a small, white one. 

“What do you think would have happened if you just said you were coming to find me?”  
He watches her eyes get wider. Mouth open, mouth close. Say nothing.  
So he continues.

He screws up his face, gives her a hard look.  
“Would it be that bad? If these people - our friends - knew we were together? Would it be _that_ bad?”

He hadn’t expected to let this all out here, now. But now that it’s coming, it’s coming.  
“The harder we have to fight to hide this, the more lying we have to do. I hate lying. You _hate_ lying.” He pauses, sighs. “What are we lying for?”  
Now it’s his turn to let a hard question hang in the air between them.

For the first time, she looks away from him, off into the distance. Thinking.  
When she looks back at him, she looks sorry. She looks small.

He instantly feels badly for pushing her like this, even though he also feels real relief for getting this off his chest. He takes a few steps toward her, softens his tone. Reaches over and rubs her shoulder.

“Tessa, like half the people here are dating each other. Everybody knows. It's seem to be ok for them.” 

Finally, she opens her mouth and words come out.  
“Do you really want to be like them, though?”  
Scott, not really sure what she means, shrugs a little, tentatively. He doesn’t see anything wrong with ‘them’.

“Like Nik and Laurence?” she asks. He shakes his head a bit. Now he’s a little less sure. He definitely doesn’t want to talk to Tessa the way Nik talks to Lolo.  
But he also thinks they’re the exception, not the rule.

“I wouldn’t mind being like Zach and Olivia,” he suggests, more gently.  
Admittedly, he doesn’t know that much about their relationship - he’s hardly given it any thought until now -, but from his perspective, they’re a pretty normal, fun couple. 

Tessa opens her eyes wider.  
“You want to be like Zach? Have you seen his instagram?”

Scott has zero idea what Tessa means. He tries to shrug casually, but gets a foreboding feeling.  
“No?”

Tessa fishes her phone from her pocket, taps the screen a few times.  
She’s about to start reading out loud, but before she does, she takes another look at Scott to make sure he’s listening. Satisfied she has his full attention, she begins.

“‘10 incredible happy months have led me to a place in my life where my smile is bigger, my heart is more open, my life more full and an ever brightening future. Thank you, my love for all the laughs, memories and cute moments you and I have shared in our journey so far. W/’ - like ‘with’, and then heart emoji-” she paues, gives him a look.  
Scott frowns. Uh oh.  
Tessa continues.  
“‘From’ - _bear_ emoji”.  
“Eeee,” Scott winces.  
“Exclamation mark, kissy face emoji, heart eyes emoji, heart emoji...”  
Scott starts shaking his head, eyes squeezed shut, like he’s trying to get the image of a car wreck out of his head.

Tessa puts a finger up - like, hold on, it gets worse.  
“‘Hashtag gf’,” she reads.  
“Gluten free?” Scott interjects hopefully, and hopelessly. Tessa laughs, but presses on.  
“‘Hashtag _family_. Hashtag BLESSED. HASHTAG _THANK YOU_ ’.”  
“Gah!” he grimaces, shudders.  
“Oh, and his comments on her posts are ever more-”  
“Please. No. Don’t even tell me.” Scott makes a show of covering his ears with his hands.

“He calls her ‘kitsune’,” Tessa whispers, as though deeply disturbed.  
Scott winces again.  
“Do I want to know?”  
“It’s Japanese. For fox.”  
“Ugh. Jesus Christ,” he spits.  
“Yes,” she says sadly. “Our good friend Zach is extra. Very, _very_ extra.”

Even if he’s not 100% confident on the meaning of that term, Scott gets her drift.  
They won’t be modeling themselves on Zach and Olivia. 

But really, the whole poking fun of Zach thing seems more like a distraction from the topic at hand, and less like a real concern Tessa has. She must know Scott doesn't have that kind of thing in him. His social media presence is mostly just tweets he's contractually obligated to make.  
He tries to laugh, but just ends up sighing, plunks himself down on the corner edge of the bed.  
He doesn’t want to be controlling like Nik.  
And he doesn’t want to make people sick like Zach.  
He just wants Tessa.  
He feels so tired.

He reaches out for her hips, tugs her toward him. Feeling his pull, she easily takes the few steps to come close.  
He shuts his eyes and presses his forehead into her stomach.  
He feels his blood pressure drop 50 points as she starts running her hands through his hair. 

“Thank you for putting up with me,” she says very softly. “It’ll get better. I promise.”  
He pulls her a little closer, wanting to believe her.  
He needs to believe her.


	21. Chapter 21

##  March 2017 / April 2017 

### Tessa 

###  In a bathroom stall, Tessa pulls up her pants, smooths her top, and quickly rummages through her purse hanging on a hook on the door. Trying to think if there’s anything she should buy in the airport before the flight takes off. 

She’s still thinking, a little distracted, and is caught off guard when she steps out to wash her hands, and her eyes instantly meet Gabriella’s in the mirror.  
“Oh, hey!” Tessa tries to be cheery, but it’s slightly desperate sounding. “Ready for this?”

Gabi half smiles in response - it’s hard to say if it’s a smirk or just the way she smiles. But either way, she’s not giving much back.  
“Sure,” she shrugs, maybe a bit sarcastically.

Tessa cringes. She didn’t do their relationship any favours the night they shared a room in Kingston earlier in the month. Things with Gabi were already a little weird before that, and then that same night Scott got upset, Tessa wasn’t happy with how she handled it, and was preoccupied when she got back to their hotel room. 

When Tessa came into the room, Gabi made a joke - something about how she was still wearing Dylan’s shirt after their group game of truth or dare. But Tessa, deep down the rabbit hole mulling over her conversation (or was it an argument?) with Scott, totally missed the joke, and didn’t laugh.

It was only when she saw Gabi deflate, close off, that she realized she hadn’t reacted appropriately. She opened her mouth to apologize, to ask Gabi to repeat herself, but before she could do it, Gabi slipped into the bathroom, her toiletries and pyjamas tucked under her arm, and shut the door.

Tessa tried to get Gabi chatting when she eventually came out of the bathroom, but it felt strained and didn’t go far. Clearly, Gabi had interpreted Tessa’s reaction as disinterested and unfriendly, and not as distracted.

Tessa felt a little helpless, wanted a do-over, but didn’t want to explain why. It seemed too complicated to mention anything about Scott - she definitely had no intention of talking to Gabi about their relationship, but she also didn’t want to leave her with the impression it was a team issue... It didn’t feel great, but she decided it was best to just let it go, explain nothing to Gabi, and push through the awkwardness.

In a sort of work-around, Tessa called her mum so that she was on the phone for the last few minutes before Gabi climbed into her bed, turned her back to Tessa, hair fanned out across her pillow, and by all indications, fell asleep.

Now, nearly a month later, here they are in a PET Airport bathroom, and the dynamic between them hasn’t much improved. There haven’t exactly been many opportunities to make reparations. Nerves have been running high over the month since camp, as Gadbois hunkered down into serious Worlds prep mode.  
And of course, everyone paying any attention to the sport consider Papadakis/Cizeron Virtue/Moir’s only real challengers for the title.  
The hunters and the hunted.  
This hasn’t exactly been the time to become better friends. 

Tessa watches the frothy water spill over her hands.  
Whose idea was it to book them on the same flight to Helsinki, anyway?

Gabi turns to leave the airport bathroom, and Tessa looks up and smiles at her again in the mirror.  
“See you out there,” Tessa offers.  
Gabi smiles back a little, nods briefly again.  
There’s no edge to it, and maybe it’s slightly warmer. That’s about as good as it’s going to get. 

...

Driving through Helsinki to the hotel, Tessa, exhausted, gazes out the window of the shuttle bus. Watching the city whiz by through the hazy veil of her jetlag. 

“You guys been here before, Tessa?”  
It takes her a moment to figure out who’s speaking to her. Her head swivels around until her eyes land on Zach, peering at her from just across the aisle.  
“Umm.. yeah! But not since 2004… Really seems like a lifetime ago,” she pauses a second. “I guess it practically was. The main thing I remember is that Anna Cappellini and I bonded cause we both had Juicy Couture tracksuits.” She laughs, and shudders.  
A row up, Madi turns and laughs too.  
“Juicy! We should bring that back. So comfy!”  
Tessa laughs again, but makes an exaggerated ‘I’m not so sure’ face.

“Last time we were here, Tess wasn’t speaking to me,” Scott calls from where he sits a few rows back. Tessa twists in her seat to look back at him. She can’t remember what he’s talking about.

He makes a sheepish face, addresses her directly.  
“‘Member? You were so proud of your Britney Spears perfume. Until I kept telling everyone you smelled ‘curious’.”  
Everybody laughs.  
“Ughhh!” Tessa cries, remembering. “You were horrible!” she laughs, too, but feels her face flush red, briefly reliving that especially excruciating embarrassment teenagers feel.  
Remembering how mad Scott could make her then, and how often.

“Not my proudest,” he nods bashfully. “But to be fair - I haven’t made fun of how you smell in at _least_ a year.”  
Tessa rolls her eyes at him, but laughs with the others in spite of herself.  
“Sounds like you were trouble back then, Scotty!” Zach hoots.  
“‘Trouble’ doesn’t even being to describe it,” scoffs Tessa, still laughing but also marvelling at the memory of how truly obnoxious he was.  
Mercifully, he’s come a long way.

...

When they arrive at the hotel, Tessa is delighted to find that it’s quirky, chic, boutique-y - much more to Tessa (and undoubtedly to Kate’s) liking than the gauche monstrosity they stayed at for 4CC. 

But there’s hardly any time to take it in. People make their way to their rooms, drop their stuff, try to find a bite to eat, then reassemble to head to the rink, register, do media, mingle.  
Worlds is by far the biggest competition of the year, not only in terms of importance but also in terms of number of skaters. It’s huge. There’s no time for rest.

The chaos notwithstanding, things go well. Tessa feels calm. She feels ready. Scott seems much on the same page. Cool as a cucumber. Happy. It’s nice to see how much better he manages himself, his stress, than he used to. 

Where Scott has learned to control himself better, Tessa has made progress, too. She has made a concerted effort to drop the superstitions she used to lean on like crutches. It’s taken some work, but she’s mostly comfortable without them now.  
She slaps her guards carelessly down on the boards.  
Turns a blind eye to loose change on the ground.  
She still ties her left skate first, but she justifies that one as more muscle memory than anything.

For the most part, foregoing the superstitions has made her feel more in control, not less, as she initially worried it would. It feels good to be rational, when she can accept that thing X has no effect on thing Y.  
For example: _The angle of my guards on the boards has nothing to do with our NTMSS._  
For the most part now, it seems so obvious, it feels stupid to even think it.

Nevertheless, though, there is some fundamental part of her that thinks in a superstitious way. It’s just in her nature to want to see the interconnectedness of seemingly unconnected things. And of course, when things go wrong, superstition, bad luck, having tempted fate, are often more convenient and satisfying explanations than their more logical counterparts. 

Getting ready for practice one of the first mornings, Tessa excitedly unzips a Feeling garment bag containing her new free dance dress. A variation on the earlier versions she’s worn this season, but in a very pretty, very pale, powdery pink. She can’t wait to wear it. She thinks it’s a better shade for her fair skin and dark hair than the previous, rosier one.

But less than two hours later, she finds herself leaning over the boards, watching a very polite, very petite medic delicately bandage her sliced-up finger, which she cut grabbing her blade in a twizzle.

She frowns down at herself, dots of bright red blood sprayed across her pristine dress. She won’t be able to wear it now. Thank goodness she has the other one with her.

Scott makes his way over to check in.  
“All good?” He peeks over her shoulder. 

She glances back at him, smiles sadly.  
“Oh yeah,” she sighs. Ice dancers cut themselves this way all the time. “My dress, though.”

She shudders, remembering that she’d joked with Mathieu about whether he needed to leave a safety pin in the hem of this dress - another decades-long superstition of hers. One she hadn’t quite let go of, until that moment.  
“You know what.. No,” she’d said to him confidently. “Let’s leave it out this time.”  
“Ah k,” he’d said, chuckling. He’d probably thought it was a silly request for her other costumes (“What’s it ...for?” he’d asked her, confused, the first time she’d asked him to leave one in). “I think, you don’t need it!”  
“Right,” she’d smiled at him.  
Of course she didn’t need it. Did she?

“You have the old one here, though, hey?” Scott offers reasonably, referring to the version of the dress she’s worn since Grand Prix Final. He arches his eyebrows at her. “It’s been pretty lucky for us so far.”  
She’s smiles again, nods. He may not realize it, but it’s a fitting choice of words - lucky. Hopefully. 

...

Any worries Tessa has about bad luck quickly fade to the corners of her mind on the morning of short dance day. Everything works. Spirits are high. Nerves are steady. Turns are sharp. Edges are deep. She and Scott nail their program and are rewarded with a world record score and a massive lead over Gabi and Guillaume, who trail distantly in second, with everyone else nipping at their heels.

Early in the evening, Tessa, Scott and their families go out for an early dinner before heading back to the rink to watch the women’s free skate. 

Scott is wired. Stoked. Jacked. Pumped. Ecstatic about their skate earlier in the day. Tessa watches happily as he regales the table with stories about life in Montreal, about dance classes with Liam, about the vagaries of cross-training runs up Mont Royal, about Marie’s surprisingly low-brow sense of humour…It’s great to see him so happy and relaxed.

But then, part way through the meal, a familiar form catches Tessa’s eye.  
A tiny woman with exquisite posture in a full length fur coat.  
Tessa knows instantly before she can even really see.  
It’s Marina.

Everyone in the Virtue and Moir party pushes away from the table, and stands to greet her. Whatever they each think of her now, Marina loomed large in their lives for a decade. She called the shots on almost every detail of Tessa and Scott’s lives, which in turn had a major impact on their families. She made Tessa and Scott who they were.

Tessa tenses up, never quite sure how to be when she sees Marina now. But she’s quickly reminded that if Marina is anything - apart from an ice dance genius -, it’s charming.  
Likely, they can sit back and Marina will easily fill the space and time without much help from anyone else.

As Kate and the Moirs re-take their seats around the table, Tessa and Scott remain standing, flanking Marina.  
Everyone watches Marina, transfixed, as she waxes eloquent in her somehow both clipped and gravelly Russian accent about how magnificent Tessa and Scott were in their short dance. 

Tessa watches Marina closely, studying her. There is no denying it: her feelings about Marina are complicated.  
Gratitude, fond memories, regret, bitterness.  
Love, hate.

And it’s bizarre to now have so little contact with this person who was the centre of their universe for so long.  
Tessa has probably spent a combined total of five minutes with Marina in the last three years, but she knows instantly looking at her that her tiny bangs have been trimmed within the last 24 hours.  
That she didn’t sleep well the night before.  
That she had at least two glasses of wine with dinner.

This must be what it’s like to run into someone you used to be married to.  
So intimately familiar, but practically a stranger at the same time.

Marina must have complicated feelings of her own. Marie and Patch are it in the ice dance world now. It’s a tiny niche, but a highly competitive business, and Marina is no longer #1. She’s not a has-been, but she’s not the most sought after, either. Tessa has to wonder whether Marina feels that her and Scott’s success this year reflects badly on her - it’s not that they had actually done all they were capable of in 2014, it’s that Marina didn’t - or couldn’t - draw it out of them.

“I always know,” says Marina emphatically, slicing the air with her hand. “I always know you can do that if you make your mind there.” Her fur-covered arm swoops and she points demonstratively at her head. “I say to Johnny today, you do it today. You must repeat, tomorrow! You put the mind _after_ the body.”

Tessa flinches. This was something Marina always said _about_ Meryl and Charlie (because they already had it), but _to_ Scott and Tessa (because they needed to get there).  
Over time, it grated particularly badly on Scott - to him, it meant that Marina thought Meryl and Charlie would always beat them in the mind game. And if there’s anything Scott still harbours bad feelings about, it’s how differently Marina treated them and Meryl and Charlie in the build up to Sochi. 

__

Tessa plasters a grin on her face, nodding mechanically as Marina talks. But her eyes flit to Scott’s face, just beyond Marina’s. Sure enough, his jaw is clenched. A now rarely-seen vein emerges, throbbing at his temple.

His response to this classic, infamous Marina line is practically Pavlovian - bell rings, dog salivates. Statement made, Scott rages.

As if knowing she has dropped a bomb and should flee, Marina readjusts her giant purse on her shoulder.  
“Ok! I go. So much love from me to you, and for tomorrow!” she says, grabbing Scott’s face in her hands and kissing his cheeks. As Marina turns to do the same to Tessa, Tessa sees Scott swallow hard and grimace, his body violently rejecting Marina’s affection. 

After Marina is gone, Scott’s mood does an about-face. He goes from grinning and chatty to stoney faced and silent. 

Tessa watches, helpless, as he pounds his glass of ice water and then throws his napkin on his plate, his food only partially eaten. 

She turns her energy to filling the void he left, by making the conversation he had been making. Asking Alma and Carol about their grandchildren (happily, this takes a while, because there are many), and their dad (“slowing down quite a bit”), and the Ilderton Skating Club’s season so far, trying her best to pay attention to their responses. 

But all the while, keeping a worried eye on Scott.  
And wishing for all the world that they’d chosen a different restaurant.

...

After dinner, as planned, they all head back to the arena to catch the last few flights of the women’s free skate. Gabby and Kaetlyn both have incredible skates. Tessa’s so thrilled for them. And she feels a wave of relief when she stands to applaud Gabby and glances down the row at Scott, and he’s eagerly cheering, too.  
Maybe he’s moved on from Marina, she thinks. 

When they bundle into their coats to go back to the hotel, she discreetly steps up to him.  
“Carol offered to make us some tea in her room when we get back. She brought the good stuff from home.” She shoots him a wink. As kids, SleepyTime tea was a key ritual the night before competitions. Scott’s aunt always travels with some. 

He looks away.  
“Thanks. But I think I’ll just shower and head to bed.”  
Her stomach drops. But she smiles and nods.  
“Ok, good plan.” 

Scott turns to start walking toward the exit, and Tessa hangs back a moment to give him some space. She feels an old but familiar fear spread through her stomach. The feeling of Scott shutting her out.

She uses every last ounce of mental strength she has left after an exhausting day to push yet another old, unhelpful superstitious thought from her brain. But she can’t help herself.  
First, her ruined dress.  
Now, Marina wreaking havoc on Scott’s psyche.  
_Bad things happen in threes._  
She shivers.

...

In the morning, Tessa wakes up, refreshed, and determined. The night before seems distant, and she feels more like herself. She stares herself down in the mirror as she brushes her teeth.  
Superstitions are useless. And if Scott isn’t already over the Marina thing, he’s going to have to get there fast.  
If he’s still in his funk, she will lead him out of it by setting a positive example.  
Or, if that doesn’t work, drag him out of it by force.  
This is the World Championships, for god sakes. They have dominated this season, and have one program left to skate.  
This is not the time to be tripped up by the problems they had - and dealt with- three years earlier.

In the elevator on her way to the lobby, she rolls her shoulders back, resolved that if Scott’s mental state hasn’t improved, she’ll barrage him with forward thinking, upbeat messaging.  
When the doors open and she sees him across the way, waiting for her, she swallows. She knows his expression, and indeed, it’s not good.  
She has her work cut out for her.

She takes a deep breath, and strides straight over to him. She’s not letting him get away with this.  
“Morning, sunshine!” she chirps. “Ready to crush this?”  
“Oh yeah,” he contorts his face into something akin to a smile, but it’s devoid of any actual joy. He looks tired.  
She nudges him with her shoulder, and they turn to walk toward the waiting bus.

At the door, she stands aside to let him on the bus first, so she can be sure to sit beside him.  
But he stands back, too, waiting for her to get on first. He’s a considerate guy, and, at least in their adult lives, he has rarely if ever passed through a doorway ahead of her.

But Tessa stands her ground. Scott looks at her for a second, vaguely confused. But she urges him on by craning her neck toward the bus door, eye brows arched, so he shrugs and gets on first. 

Sure enough, he heads way down to the back of the bus, and starts to sit in an aisle seat. Tessa follows closely on his heels and clears her throat. He looks back at her, surprised, and maybe ever so slightly annoyed. But she doesn’t care. She’s pushing him out of this. He shifts to the window seat, and she takes the seat beside him. 

He sighs as he sinks into his chair. She glances over, and watches him lean his head back, eyes closed. Very likely not in the mood to chat. But that’s too bad.

“I had a dream about Marina last night,” Tessa says eagerly. He opens his eyes, and looks at her. Presses his lips together, lifts his chin so he’s looking down his nose at her. She knows what this look means.  
_Tessa, I don’t want to talk about this._  
But she ignores him.

She starts laughing - _don’t worry, it’s funny!_  
“I was at a fast food place, and I went to order at the counter. And Marina was working the till! She had the uniform, and the little visor hat, ha, the hair net, everything!”  
Scott keeps watching her, but has yet to show any sign of amusement. 

“And I ordered fries, but she just kept screaming ‘You! Onion rings! Onion rings!’ every time I said fries.” Tessa pauses to laugh again. “And I was getting so frustrated with her, cause, ha, I wanted my damn fries! But then I bent over to look at something on the ground, or… pick something up? I’m not sure... But, anyway, when I stood back up, Marina had turned into Nicki Minaj. And, ha, you know, even she was much more pleasant to deal with…” 

Finally, Scott cracks a little smile. Tessa pounces. She will take this inch and turn it into a mile.  
She takes a breath, softens her tone.

“So that was kinda weird running into her last night, hey?” She searches Scott’s face.  
His tiny smile disappears. He frowns.  
“Yep.”  
“We’ve come a really long way since Marina.” She tries to say this like she means it, cause she does. “She doesn’t really know us anymore. Her opinion is just kind of… whatever.”  
Scott looks down at his hands for a long moment, fiddling with one of his water bottle lids.

“Remember yesterday,” she tries again, quietly, firmly. “We can do that again today. We both know that.”  
He nods slowly.  
“You’re right.” He looks at her again, frowning, she hopes with determination. 

...

When they get to the rink, they start their off-ice warm up in the back hallways of the arena. Stretching, floor exercises, running through bits of the program.  
Whenever the choreography requires Tessa to touch Scott - his shoulder, his back, his chest, his leg - she makes a point of pressing a little more firmly than she usually would in a run through. To make sure it’s not just a cursory touch, or going through the motions, but a physical reminder - I’m here. We can do this. We’re ready.

...

In practice on the ice, they run through Latch one last time. Before they perform it for the last time.  
The ending pose is more than well-established by this point: Scott takes a knee, then bends Tessa over his leg, and rests his head on her chest, and she lays her hands in his hair.

But when they get to that part in practice, he doesn’t dip her. She goes to lean back, but he cradles her head in his hand, pressing her toward him. Their foreheads come together.  
Scott runs his hands down her bare back. 

“We got this,” he says through his heavy breathing. “Like yesterday.”  
Tessa trails her finger tips down his chest.  
“We do,” she says back softly. 

She’s happy to hear him say this, repeat what she said to him earlier, but really, she knows he’s not saying it for her benefit. He’s saying it for his own. 

...

At long last, Tessa and Scott take the ice for their free skate, circling around the rink around in the usual way. The crowd roars when Gabi and Guillaume’s marks are announced. They have a world record of their own. 

Tessa and Scott come to face each other on the World Championships logo at centre ice.  
They take each other’s hands.  
Just before the music starts, Scott reaches up and tucks Tessa’s hair behind her ear.  
“Together,” she whispers as he does this, and he nods almost imperceptibly.  
She forces herself to ignore the shadow of doubt in his eyes.

Wistful piano music fills the arena. Pilgrims on a Long Journey.

Seconds into the program, the first set of twizzles.  
Bend to the knee, rise up, straight into the first pass.  
From the corner of her eye, Tessa sees Scott bobble slightly.  
“Centre,” she says to him - a key word they often use to remind themselves to find their balance. He just needs to get his feet under him, she assures herself.  
The second pass is better, but by the end of the set, their unison is off.

They turn out, and then back to each other, grab each other’s forearms. Move through the dance. Tessa wills herself to feel it, to not race through it. 

The entry into the next set of twizzles starts from a modified killian hold, Scott pushing Tessa into it, with him following right behind her.  
It starts off well enough.  
But when they turn to step out, Scott drops out of Tessa’s sight line.  
Even if for only a split second, he’s down.

He pops up like a whack-a-mole, and Tessa grabs his hand. Squeezes it hard in her own.  
At this point, it’s more than abundantly clear: she needs to be strong for both of them.  
She can’t _let him_ lose control.  
“Very dramatic,” she deadpans out the side of her mouth.  
She hears him make a quick surprised laugh sound, which only strengthens her resolve. He isn’t lost altogether. 

She pushes through into the program, and he follows closely behind.  
It’s not easy, but they make it through to the end.  
As the music fades out, Scott lays his head on Tessa’s chest. She moves her hands to his hair, and rubs her thumb over his ear tenderly. Already wanting to reassure him. His grip on her is incredibly tight.

When he does let her go and she stands, he looks up at her from where he kneels on the ice.  
“Fuck,” he pants. “Sorry.”  
“Don’t be,” she rests her hands on his shoulders as he pushes up to stand, and she throws her body against his, hugs him as hard as she can.  
It’s a complicated feeling, but the main thought in her brain is that she’s really proud of him. Maybe more proud than ever. He really did bounce back after his fall.  
He hugs her, too, but it’s not forceful the way hers is.  
She practically feels him crumble in her arms. 

As they skate toward the boards, Tessa holds Scott’s hand firmly, comes a little closer and runs her free hand up his forearm. They sit in the Kiss and Cry, and she rubs his back. They lean their heads together.  
Of course, there’s no time to actually talk, but she wants him to feel her.

Finally, after what feels like forever, their scores flash on the jumbotron.  
The first number that Tessa sees is 2.  
Two.  
Second.  
Shit.

But then the crowd roars. Their total score is enough to hold on to first place overall. Tessa grins, grateful, relieved the collective reaction to the result is positive. She nods, looking around, to show her appreciation.  
But she looks over at Scott, and he seems to be frozen, staring at the scoreboard, mouth open. Obviously still reeling. She reaches over to rub his back again.

A very pleasant Finnish journalist zips into the Kiss and Cry a few minutes later, for the Winners’ Interview that will be broadcast in the arena, and probably on TV.  
Sensing that Scott isn’t feeling like a winner, Tessa makes him trade places with her, in the hopes that she’ll be able to do more of the talking. 

“Olympic season, it’s the next season,” the journalist says. “It is somehow… very special?”  
Tessa launches into an answer about how it is special, how they’ve used this season to prepare for the Olympics, how they’re hoping their skating will continue to improve.

Out of nowhere, Scott wraps his arm around her shoulder, leans them both forward so he can reach the microphone. He looks out into the audience.  
“Wasn’t she great today? Wasn’t she just…”  
His voice trails off, apparently at a loss for words.  
“She held my butt up today! She was fantastic!” He squeezes her tightly, and his voice echos through the loud speaker.  
It’s so sweet, but it’s frustrating too. She doesn’t want him setting himself apart from her.  
“And I think he was too?” the journalist looks to Tessa. Tessa responds right away.  
“He was," Tessa nods emphatically. "He always is.” 

After the medal ceremony, they walk backstage. Tessa stays close to Scott.  
She has no doubt he’s dying to get out of here. He seems to be feeling even worse after standing on the podium and hearing Oh Canada. Undoubtedly some lethal mix of guilt, self-loathing, and exhaustion. She could feel it in the way he touched her.  
But there’s press to do. The winners don’t typically skip that to sulk.  
She’ll keep taking the lead, as much as she can. 

Brenda Irving from CBC marches up to them, camera crew in tow. Tessa takes a deep breath. This interview is especially important: it’s for Canada.

“Tessa, Scott: you’ve got your third world title, but you sure made it interesting. Scott, you didn’t miss a beat after that misstep, but it had to be a challenge to get back in the program that quick.”  
The smiles drops off Tessa’s face. Of course, it’s a fair question, but she feels protective of Scott. She hates that the narrative is already setting in stone: Tessa was perfect. Scott fucked up.  
She wants to reach over and knock the microphone out of Brenda’s hand.

But Scott gives a gracious answer about the joke Tessa made, how he had no choice but to follow her.  
“Parts of our career, you have to rely on each other. I can honestly say, T really gave me a lot of strength today.” She feels her heart swell in her throat. “It wasn’t obviously my best program, but when you have a superstar partner, sometimes you get away with that. Got away with it today.” 

Tessa balks at ‘superstar partner,’ not liking his implication that he isn’t one. But before she can say anything, Brenda presses them.  
“Yeah, but you had a world record total score. I guess the question is, how much better can your skating get?”  
Tessa and Scott both have the same reaction - they laugh uncomfortably. It’s an awkward question generally - they always strive to improve-, but especially after the skate they just had, it’s a weird one to answer. _Maybe we could ...not fall down?_  
Tessa answers, ignoring her worn-out impulse to say something sarcastic, instead twisting her answer to be more about how excited they are to keep working. How they love trying to be better.  
As she talks, she feels Scott watching her closely, and then feels his hand run up her back and gently squeeze the base of her neck. 

...

After the insanity finally dies down, Tessa and Scott end up in Tessa’s room with their massage therapist, Denise. Although it would tempting to collapse into bed, or down a hundred cocktails, a proper cool-down is critical to their ongoing conditioning.

Denise sets up her table by the window, and works on Scott first. Tessa sits on the edge of the bed and chats with Denise, working to keep the mood up. Denise seems to be enjoying herself as she works, but Scott is more than quiet. He's despondent. His normally powerful body looks like a ragdoll as Denise flops his limbs around in her strong hands.

When Denise finishes with Scott, Tessa expects him to beg off, to drag himself back to his own room. But he doesn’t. Instead, he flops face first onto Tessa’s bed. Lays like a cadaver, arms and legs splayed haphazardly across the comforter. Face smooshed into the pillow sham.

Tessa watches this with some mix of relief and concern, as she hops up on the table herself. Mostly, relieved that at least he’s not trying to isolate himself. But still worried he seems to be in such a low down place.

“Should I get some chalk for the outline?” asks Denise, gesturing with her head toward Scott as she digs firmly into Tessa’s quads, and she and Tessa both glance over at him. He really does look dead.  
Tessa giggles, but when Scott lets out a low groan, she feels badly.

After Denise finishes up with Tessa, Denise folds up the table and gathers her things. Tessa gives Denise a quick hug, walks with her to the door. Waits to hear the soft click of the mechanism as it shuts behind her.

Tessa walks softly back toward the bed, and sees that Scott has actually moved, curling himself into the fetal position. She sits carefully on the edge of the bed, looks to his face and sees that his eyes are squeezed shut.  
“Scott?” she says gently, as she reaches to brush the hair from his eyes.  
He doesn’t say anything, but she feels him breathe a sigh against against her wrist.

She turns and climbs over him. Curls her body around his and wraps her arm over him. Big spoon to his little spoon. He makes a low groaning sound again, covers her arm with his, holding onto her wrist with his hand.  
It’s the first sign of life he’s shown. It’s encouraging, at least a little.

She arches her neck so she can whisper right into his ear.  
“We are the world champions, you know,” she teases him very gently. “You may not think so, but that’s _kind of_ a bigger deal than your little slip.”  
She waits a few breaths, and then whispers again, “I really thought you were great.”  
She leaves a tiny kiss behind his ear.

Even though he gives no other response, he does tighten his grip around her wrist. The reality is, whether she wants him to or not, he needs to wallow. He's not going to snap out of this immediately. She pushes herself up for a moment, reaches over him to turn off the lamp on the nightstand beside him.  
The room falls into darkness.

She sinks back down, wrapping herself around him again. She presses her forehead into the top of his back, and squeezes him a little tighter. 

As their breathing fall into synch, they drift off to sleep.

...

In the middle of the night, Tessa wakes up when Scott stirs, turning over to face her.  
Their bodies curl toward each other, mirror images of each other.  
He runs his hand up her side, but keeps his eyes closed.  
“Should we get under the covers, T?” he mutters sleepily. 

Tessa wakes up gradually, slowly remembering that they’re still in their sweats, they fell asleep in her room after Denise left.  
That they’re the world champions, but it didn’t go quite as they’d hoped it would.  
That this is the first full sentence Scott's spoken in hours.

Her eyes trace Scott’s outline in the darkness. His wild hair, his angular cheekbone, the rise of his muscular shoulder. He’s so beautiful.

She’s lost in the thought, and doesn’t answer his question.  
His eyes creak open and he blinks at her a few times. She can just barely see the whites of his eyes glint in the dark.  
“Or I can go back to my room if you want?”  
There’s not a hint of expectation in it, no passive aggression. He’s just wants to do what she wants him to.  
Even after the day he’s had, he’d give up the comfort of her bed, of her body, in the middle of the night, without complaint, if she told him to.  
She's so lucky to have him.

“No, no. Please, stay,” she says, reaching up and running her fingers gently through his hair. He pulls her closer to him.  
Their foreheads come together, and his breathing gets louder.

“You were so amazing today, Tess. In every way,” he pauses briefly. “I keep thinking how I almost lost it for you. I can’t handle -” he pauses again. He’s struggling. “-the thought of ...letting you down. I … let you down.”

Their faces millimetres apart, she starts shaking her head against the pillow. Her mind racing with a million things she wants him to know.  
_You didn’t._  
_You wouldn’t._  
_You never could._

But there’s only one thing to say, and she doesn’t need to think it. She just feels it.  
It bubbles up from the pit of her stomach, surges from the tips of all her fingers and toes. Explodes through her chest.  
She’s said the words a hundred? or maybe thousand? times to him before.  
But this is different.

“Scott,” she breathes into the darkness. “I love you.”


	22. Chapter 22

##  April 2017 

###  Scott 

###  Tessa’s words waft on the air in the nearly pitch-black room.  
_Scott. I love you._  
Even though she practically whispered them, Scott’s ears ring as if someone shot off a gun beside him.  
His heart starts racing like a rabbit’s, and his head swims.  
Did he actually hear her right? He wastes no time finding out.

“I love you, too!” he calls out, nearly yelling, and it rings in the dark like a gong sounding, especially compared to how quiet Tessa was.  
He frantically pulls her on top of him and then rolls back the other way so he’s mostly on top of her.  
He mashes his face into her neck and her hair.  
“I love you so much,” he breathes against her ear. 

As he finds her mouth with his, a gasp escapes him that he can feel deep in his chest is really a sob.  
He’s feeling a _lot_ of feelings, and he’s feeling them hard.

What’s perfect is that she giggles. She giggles right into his mouth. He knows her laugh in all its varieties, and this one means: happy and surprised. Delighted.  
It’s so Tessa.  
It’s so perfect. 

He pulls away from kissing her for a second, and presses their foreheads together again.  
He listens to her breathing, she’s still laughing a little. He tries to slow his own breath down to match hers.  
Every part of his body and brain is buzzing, moving about 1000 km/ second.  
If they’re about to have I Love You sex - which he’s pretty confident they are - he needs to get his shit together.

But before he can pull the trigger, she does. She takes his face in her hand and kisses him again, slowly and deeply this time. She’s not laughing anymore.  
She pushes up against him, so he turns off her to roll onto his back. She shimmies up on top of him, and starts pulling on the hem of his shirt to get it up and off of him.

They trade back and forth like this, rolling around and around on the bed, working to get all of their clothes off.

When he finally pushes inside of her, he whispers in her ear again.  
“I love you, Tessa.”  
She grabs the curls at the nape of his neck, and kisses his jaw.  
“I love you, Scott.”

...

Spent, they lay together, staring at the ceiling. Tangled, on top of the covers still, but naked now. Immune to the room’s temperature, or the time of night, or anything else.  
Just blissfully basking in the hum still rising from their bodies.

What made that sex truly insane was that it didn’t only mark a major milestone in their relationship. It also afforded them the intense connection and release they needed after several pressure-filled days.  
It definitely hit the spot. 

“You know what I hate?” Scott asks out of nowhere, tugging at Tessa to move closer to him. She complies, shimmies over and rests her cheek and her palm on his chest.  
“France.”

She cranes her neck to look at him.  
“Because of Gabriella and Guillaume?!” she laughs, surprised.  
“Oh. Uhhh, nah, I’m fine with them,” he ponders aloud. “But no, more like, I guess, I mean eating snails is just... _disgusting_ -” he grimaces for effect here- “And, uhh, honestly, I think Thierry Henry might be a secret dirtbag.”  
Tessa keeps laughing, but also looks up at him like he’s lost his mind.  
“I just, I don’t think you should go there. It won’t be fun. Cause France sucks.”  
_Oh_ , she mouths briefly, and then chuckles softly as she rests her cheek back on his chest.  
“It’s only a few days,” she says to reassure him. “And I kinda doubt I’ll run into Thierry Henry.” 

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” he sighs, squeezing her. “And remember. Ilderton, Ontario offers the same Parisian style you love, without the attitude. We’d be thrilled to have you!”  
Man it would be nice if she came home with him for a few days.  
He wonders momentarily if she’d ever actually consider it. Tries to ignore the feeling that she probably wouldn't. 

She laughs heartily again, quickly pecks a kiss near his nipple  
“I’ll let you try to convince Kate of that…” she jokes as she turns to push herself up. “It’s gonna be another long day tomorrow. I’m going to brush my teeth, but we should try to get some more sleep.”  
She pats his stomach before she stands up.

Scott stifles the impulse to grab after her, keep her on the bed, so as not to burst the bubble they’re in. When they go back to sleep, wake up in the morning, when she goes off to Paris with her mom, and who knows what after that, this night, this perfect time together, will be gone forever.

They’ve shared a lifetime of chasing, and trying to seize, perfect moments.  
This is one of the ones he’d like to keep forever.

But that’s not how perfect moments go.  
He let’s her go, gets up himself, and starts peeling the blankets back.

...

In the morning, Scott wakes up to Tessa stirring against him. He cracks an eye lid, and sunlight streams in through the slit between the drapes. 

“It’s nearly 8 already,” she murmurs. “Small medals, gala practice, media…” she trails off.  
“Gala. Banquet,” he finishes for her groggily as he comes to.  
He’s a morning guy, but an exhausted one.

She turns to start getting up, and this time he does grab her, pulls her back toward him.  
“But it isn’t 8 yet,” he growls as he drags her closer.  
She laughs, or more like squeals, pushes back against him.  
“It’s 7:55! We can’t be late. I need to get in the shower.”  
He doesn’t relent, tries another angle instead.  
“Conserve water. Shower together,” he intones, still clutching her.  
She laughs again.  
“Ok. You can come. But we actually need to focus on washing ourselves.” She pries his arm from around her waist.

“What else would we do, Tessa,” he scoffs, pretending to be scandalized by her implication that he had anything else in mind.  
With that, he springs eagerly out of bed behind her.

In the shower, he stands back and stares at her unabashedly, watching the water fall over her ridiculous body as she rinses her hair. He’s briefly, pleasantly, reminded of the cheesy porn he watched as a teenager (... and maybe sometimes as an adult). Her belly button ring thing has always made him crazy. 

Coming to the realization he’s ogling her, she laughs at him again, and then gives him a look.  
“Scott. Start washing your hair.”  
She hands him the shampoo.

He makes a show of screwing up his face in disappointment.  
“I guess you were serious about this whole getting clean thing,” he says dejectedly.  
“I guess I was,” she laughs as she steps out from under the water to make room for him.

But as he goes to move past her, she reaches out and takes his hips in her hands, like she wants to slow dance.  
This surprises him. He feels his groin seize. 

He looks from her outstretched arms up into her face. She’s grinning at him bashfully, and starts giggling when she sees what must be a crazed look on his face.

He takes decisive action, drops the shampoo, grabs her by the waist, presses her up against the acrylic wall of the shower.  
Hears her breath catch.  
Briefly presses himself up against her, before lifting her up so she can wrap her legs around him.

...

When they’re out of the shower, they stand facing each other in the steamy, bright bathroom. Drying themselves with the small, stiff, white hotel towels. 

Tessa chats happily to him as she flips her head upside down and wraps her seething mass of wet hair in a towel. 

She whips her head back up, still talking away - about something funny, some old music video. She moves her shoulders rhythmically as she describes the choreography.  
Even in her towel turban, she’s captivating.  
Eyes flashing. Trying to make him laugh.  
He’s flooded with a heady warmth, a drunken feeling. 

_She loves me_ , he thinks, intoxicated, disbelieving, watching her intently but barely hearing a word she says. _Fuckin’ eh_. 

Suddenly, she’s holding a blow dryer in one hand and her phone in the other. She waves the phone toward his face, and he sees the white digits of its clock blur as they pass through his line of vision.  
“Scott! You better go get ready,” she says. “We have to leave soon.”

He nods dutifully, pulls on his clothes from the night before, and kisses her once more before he heads for the door.

...

Scott tugs the door to Tessa’s room closed as he steps into the hotel hallway. He’s startled when he looks up. Madi Hubbell is at the next door, her key card frozen in mid-air.  
They stare at each other.

“Hi- hey,” they say awkwardly at the same time. Scott’s mind races. After nearly a week here, there’s zero chance Madi doesn’t know this is Tessa’s room. 

Scott reaches up to run a palm across his scalp - his go-to nervous tic. His hand hits his still-soaking wet hair, and realizes it’s probably readily apparent he’s just out of the shower.  
But before he can think of anything to say, Madi puts a hand up. 

“It’s ok. I know,” she pauses, narrows her eyes. “Pretty sure you know I know.” 

“Right!” he exclaims, too brightly, and it sounds weird.  
He and Madi wade through another moment of awkward silence, and he takes a few steps toward where she stands.

“I haven’t told anyone, don’t worry,” she adds quietly as he approaches her.  
Scott starts to shrug - he’s never been very worried about that. But before he can say anything, Madi continues. She arches her eyebrows, and gives him a wry smile.  
“Although I don’t know why I’ve bothered being so discreet. You already told that whole press conference you guys are doing it, anyway.”

He winces. He’d already forgotten. The short dance press conference, not even 48 hours ago, feels like ancient history. Of all the ways he’s embarrassed himself this week, that seems like small potatoes.

“Shit. I forgot about that,” he laughs painfully. “Freudian slip, I guess. Actually, not my only slip this week!” 

Scott’s trying to be self-deprecating, but Madi draws a sharp breath, and it’s her turn to wince.  
“Please. Don’t say ‘slip’.” She presses her eyes shut.

Zach took a disastrous fall in the free dance, ripping them out of third place and relegating them to 9th overall. Definitely a completely and totally devastating result.  
“Oh - oh god. Madi, sorry.” Scott stammers, grasping at the air with his fists, wishing he could take it back.

“No. No,” Madi shakes her head. “Don’t be. It’s just, it’s still, ahh, fresh - you know.”  
“Oh, for sure.” He reaches over, and pats her shoulder. “See you at gala practice?” he asks hopefully.  
But even as he says it, he feels stupid again. In light of their placement, there’s almost no way Madi and Zach are in the gala. 

“Uh, no. No, you won’t,” she winces again, but sympathetically this time.  
Much to her credit, she seems to feel worse for Scott, who is stepping on landmines everywhere he turns in this conversation, than she does for herself. “But, um, me and Adri and Zachary and Liv are going to do some sightseeing. Maybe find one of those saunas to check out... I think it’ll be good, actually.”  
She smiles with her lips pressed tightly together. “And we’ll be at the banquet.”

“Got it. Ok. Well, have fun,” he says with finality, moving his flattened palm across the air between them as if to say, don’t worry. I’ll shut up now.

...

Although he makes good time to his room, throwing on fresh clothes, grabbing his stuff, Scott is the last person on the bus to the arena for small medals and gala practice.

His eyes instantly find Tessa near the back - not that it’s that hard. There are only a handful of people on the shuttle.  
He starts making his way toward her, but pauses when he hears a low voice at his right hip.

“Scott?” says Gabriella as he moves past her.  
“Gabi?” he says back. He stops to peer at her for a second, waiting to find out what she wants, and then steals a look back at Tessa, who quickly looks away.  
Gabi smiles up at him.  
“Ah, um, I wanted to show you this song? I, uh, thought you might like it…” her voice trails off and her eyes search his face.

“Oh!” Scott says. He definitely wasn’t expecting this, so he stands frozen in the aisle. Does she mean now?  
“I, um, thought this might be a good moment? Before we all leave on vacations,” she explains quickly.  
She seems vaguely nervous. Not exactly her usual funny, cool, French self. 

“Oh right. Yeah. For sure.” Scott gives his head a quick shake. Of course she means now. Duh. 

She scoots over into the window seat so he can sit beside her. As he waits the few seconds it takes her to do this, he peeks back at Tessa again. She seems to be keeping an eye on this interaction from where she sits several rows back, albeit discreetly.  
Scott shoots her a tiny shrug.

As he slides into the seat beside Gabi, awkwardly jamming the bag he’s carrying at his feet so as not to get it in her space, she turns to fidget with her phone.

“It’s, um, this French band, like, I guess, like, French country? And I know you like country music, so I thought you might like it?” She looks up from her phone for a second and glances at him, and he thinks to nod to show his interest, although the reality is, he’s a little thrown. There’s no doubt this is odd coming from Gabi. For months, and as recently as last night, Gabi has barely made eye contact with him, or with Tessa, unless it was absolutely necessary. 

“Ah, ok! Here it is,” she says, and threads the cord of her earbuds through her fingers, parsing one out for her, and one out for him. She’s holds his out to him, and smiles shyly when they make eye contact as he reaches to take it from her.

He can’t help but flash back to flying to Korea with Tessa a month earlier for Four Continents. How they’d shared his headphones sitting together on the plane, how it made them keep their heads together, lean into each other.  
How it felt a bit like they were sharing a secret.

It doesn’t feel right to have this little intimacy with someone else, but it’s hard to see a way out of this without being rude.  
He pops the bud in his ear.

The song starts and he feels Gabi lean into his shoulder ever so slightly. She keeps her eyes glued to the screen of her phone in her lap. 

The music is ethereal, haunting. Weird. Ghostly voices singing in what must be French (although it’s hard to make out any actual coherent words) over various murky sounds including a little of something that might be a banjo.  
Country...ish. Heavy on the ish. 

“Yeah?” asks Gabi eagerly as the song fades out, turning to look at him expectantly.  
“Uh, yep! Cool for sure,” he says, nodding again. Not exactly up his alley, but his instinct above all else is to be kind. 

“I heard it a few months ago and wanted to show you,” she says quickly. “But, ah, I wasn’t sure of the right moment…” She looks at him from under her long eyelashes.  
“Right!” he says, but it’s just a word to fill the space. He’s flummoxed by all of this. Months?

There’s an awkward pause, but mercifully, the drive is short and they’re arriving at the arena already.  
Without thinking, Scott stands up before the bus comes to a full stop. He nearly bashes his head on the low ceiling directly above the seats.

Gabi looks up at him, more wide-eyed and childlike than ever.  
“I, um, I’ll let you know… if they come to play in Montreal?”  
Now he wonders if maybe he did hit his head.  
Is she suggesting they go on a date? 

Scott has never thought of Gabi this way, for a lot of reasons.  
Reason number one - she’s not Tessa.  
She’s also nearly 10 years younger than he is.  
And, not least importantly, she’s one half of his arch rival. He is nothing if not extremely competitive, and sleeping with the enemy is just not a thing.  
To him, she’s basically Meryl, minus the annoying voice and the Disney villain vibes.

“Great!” is what he manages to blurt in response, though he cannot honestly say that he finds this great. 

Luckily, Alex Shibutani is right on his heels, waiting for him to walk down the bus aisle toward the door, so Scott is swept away before anything else insane can happen.

...

Scott and Tessa’s paths converge as they walk into the arena. They immediately exchange looks. Of course, Tessa is curious about what Gabi wanted of him. He takes a quick peek over his shoulder to make sure no one else is within immediate earshot.

“I think she’s got the hots for me!” Scott hisses quickly when he’s satisfied no one else will overhear.  
Maybe Tessa will know how to handle this. 

Tessa looks taken aback for second. But then, to Scott’s surprise, she bursts out laughing.  
A big genuine laugh.  
Apparently, she thinks he’s joking.  
“Psssssshhhhhhht,” she breathes through her laughter, and then gives him the ‘oh Scott’ look. 

He blinks at her. Even though it’s only 9:30 in the morning, today has already been a _day_. But then he starts to laugh too, out of... confusion? exhaustion? because Tessa’s laugh is so infectious?  
But actually, it _is_ pretty funny. Isn’t it?  
He’s so tired, he doesn’t even know anymore.

Before Scott can consider whether he should bother to clarify, they’re stopped in their tracks by someone working for Skating Finland.  
“Tessa and Scott!” says the young woman in that distinctive Finnish accent they’ve been hearing all week. “Please, would you be in our video on SnapChat? For gala promotion?”  
“Of course!” says Tessa sweetly, shifting her dress bag in her arms.  
“Thank you!” says the woman. “Can you please tell our viewers the gala starts now?” She holds up her phone, trains it on them. 

They do a few takes and Scott gets goofier every time. Tessa plays the straight man, as usual, but laughs happily at his antics.  
The more she laughs, the more of an ass he makes of himself.  
It’s their ages old dynamic. It fits them like a very comfortable, old glove.

...

The small medal ceremony is held in a light-filled corner of the arena. The ceremony is hosted by a slightly strange man in what looks like a waiter’s uniform. Listening to him, Scott realizes what makes the Finnish accent so distinctive. They roll their Rs like crazy.  
Rrrrrrusia. Bobrrrrrova. Brrrrrrronze.  
Scott files this piece of information away in his brain. He has a thing for accents.

Whatever happened with Gabi earlier aside, it doesn’t feel great watching her and Guillaume presented with their small gold medals for winning the free dance. Scott can hardly dispute that result, though, and it’s totally his own fault. 

He glances at Tessa, who watches attentively. He feels a nauseating wave of the grinding guilt he felt the night before rip through him.  
He came within an inch of losing this for her.  
He loves her so much.  
He closes his eyes for just a second and swallows hard.  
_Never again_ , he thinks gravely.

By the time everyone has their coin-sized medals, the organizers present expensive watches as prizes, and then ask the skaters to squeeze together for a group photo.  
Tessa stands right up against Scott. She’s wearing her little ballet kind of shoes. She seems so much littler than usual, like she could tuck right up under his chin. 

And then Gabi is right beside him on the other side. He thinks about her for a moment. Notwithstanding the aforementioned reasons why he wouldn’t touch her with a ten foot pole, it occurs to him that there’s certainly nothing _wrong_ with her. 

For just a moment, with these two beautiful women flanking him, his emotional rollercoaster takes a sharp turn, and he actually feels pretty fucking slick.  
He’s been feeling more or less delirious since yesterday, and, at least for now, he’s deliriously full of himself. 

_She’s in love with me_ , he thinks of Tessa, _and she’s got a thing for me_ , he thinks of Gabi.  
His chest actually physically puffs a little, he stands up straighter.  
_Damn. Not too shabby, Moir._

But he’s violently snapped out of this little fit of egotism when the oddball waiter/MC starts asking questions for the Q&A portion of the morning.  
He’s got to focus. The odds of him putting his foot in his mouth again, when he’s this tired, and a bit of a basketcase, are 10 to 1.

“Tessa and Scott. Last night, before you went on ice, I saw you hugging. What kind of importance does that little praise, or move, have during a competition?”

Suddenly, the mic is in Scott’s hand and the crowd waits expectantly for him to explain. He’s explained “the hug” a million times, of course, but he hasn’t had to explain it since he and Tessa started doing... a lot more than hugging.

He makes a half-hearted attempt to hold the mic up to Tessa to see if she’ll take this one, but she just beams at him. Also waiting for his answer.  
Perfect.  
He swallows.

“Well… it’s just a little thing that Tessa and I do before we…”  
His mind careens off a cliff. All he can think is, _before we fuck. Before we fuck. Before we fuck_.  
Which is pretty stupid, because they don’t make a _point_ of hugging before they fuck… But whatever! He needs to keep this together.  
“...compete! It helps us, ah, make sure that we’re...ahhh…” ... _in love_ ...“...in synch!”  
He hurries on.  
“It helps us relax a bit, especially when we have to come out after a really talented French team that absolutely killed it.”  
This feels better.  
When in doubt: deflect, deflect, deflect.

Then, Tessa gets a question about her costumes, and that’s a little reprieve, too. This isn’t generally his area. In fact, he eases up enough that he manages to make a joke as Tessa finishes her answer.  
“Huh. No one’s raving about _my_ costumes,” he quips out of the side of his mouth to Maia and Alex. 

The host picks up on this.  
“I need to ask Scott. Are you envious of the attention? Or, do you _like_ the costumes she’s wearing?”

He’s handed the mic again, as he squawks a big awkward laugh. He clutches it in his fist. Before he can think it through, he’s already talking.  
“I, uhhhh,... she looks beautiful in whatever she wears,” he blurts. 

A roaring ‘WooOoooooOoo’ comes up from the crowd, like the laugh track on an episode of Full House.  
Reflexively, he ‘wooooos’ back, mimicking the audience, and everyone, including Tessa, seems to love it.  
_Thank god._  
It gives him a second to compose himself.  
“I’m not jealous for sure. It’s my job,” he shrugs, as nonchalantly as he can. “If people are looking at Tessa, it means I’m doing my job.”  
This ballroom dance doctrine has been drilled into them for 15, if not 20, years, and he really does believe it.

The host clucks his tongue, mildly disapproving of this answer, but it’s enough to satisfy him such that he turns his attention to the other teams for a while.  
Another brief reprieve.  
But then, inevitably, it comes back around.

“When you woke up - this question is to all of you - and you were the new World medalists, the best on this planet in ice dance, what were your first thoughts when you woke up?”

Eeeeeeeesh. Scott starts rubbing his eye as he puzzles what he could possibly say. 

It’s not that he doesn’t remember waking up that morning - he remembers it _very_ clearly. Tessa’s naked body curled against his, the sound she made when he reached for her.  
Barely believing that she’d said she loved him. How badly he wanted her, again.  
Basically, not a single one of his first-thing-this-morning thoughts could possibly be mentioned.  
He’d have to flat out lie.

Mercifully, before he has to resort to that, Tessa takes the microphone, and gives a very Tessa ‘hard work’, fleeting moments’, ‘embrace the process’ etc., answer.  
He thinks - _hopes_ \- these weren’t actually her first thoughts this morning, but whatever.  
She got the job done, as she so often does.

...

By the time it’s gala practice time an hour later, Scott is relieved to be back on the ice. He survived more media, a slightly awkward meeting with a big group of very nice Russian fans.  
Now, he’s still zonked, but finally feels a little more himself.

Waiting for direction on one of the group numbers, he stands around with Luca, Kaetlyn, and Anna. Guillaume and Gabi hover nearby. 

They’re comparing notes on how they’ve each dealt with their high-strung, stressed out coaches this week. They’re all goofing around, trying to one up each other.  
_No, my coach is crazier_.  
Scott seizes the opportunity to bust out the impression of Patch he’s been workshopping in his head for a while now. 

He hunches a little, crosses his arms over his chest. Screws up his face in what he thinks is a very Patch way.  
“Ehh - Why you’re doing that?” he mumbles out of the corner of his mouth in his best approximation of Patch’s flat Quebecois accent.  
He folds his arms over his chest, and gestures into the distance with his chin, the way Patch often does. 

The others laugh, impressed.  
“Oh my god,” Guillaume chuckles dryly (about as animated as he ever gets). “Yeah, It’s him!” He glances at Gabi. “It’s good, eh?”  
“SO good!” gushes Gabi, and suddenly her arm is around Scott’s neck and she’s got him in some kind of flirtatious headlock.

He’d already sort of forgotten their interaction on the bus earlier. After Tessa laughed it off, and after all of the other shit they’ve had to do today, it stopped seeming important.  
But now, feeling her hanging off of him, leaning her head against his, he’s reminded pretty quickly that he might need to deal with this. Somehow.

Scott grabs her wrist in his hand. Gives it a friendly little squeeze, but then shrugs her off.  
Is he flattered? Sure. Does he want to encourage this? Definitely not.

The practice gets back on track a few minutes later, and Scott skates over to Tessa, who’s standing with Carolina. He takes Tessa’s hand so they can get in position. 

Tessa tugs on his arm a little, and he looks at her.  
“You weren’t joking,” she whispers quickly as they come together, staring at him wide-eyed.  
He hadn’t realized she was watching. She must have seen Gabi hanging off of him  
He gives her his most emphatic hell-no-I-wasn’t-joking face. She looks at him for another moment, and then looks away. Apparently, thinking this over.

“What the fuck,” he hears her whisper under her breath, very, very quietly.  
And it makes him smile.

...

At 8:30 pm, Scott’s already a little more buzzed than he ought to be. Or maybe more like fuzzy (fuzzed?), as a result of 2.5 glasses of wine, and how exhausted he is.  
He’s such lightweight these days. It’s shameful.

He stands with Poje, leaning against the hotel front desk, doubling as a bar for the banquet which, for some reason, is being held in the lobby. They’re speaking to each other intermittently, the way men do, really more an exchange of grunts than anything.  
Both pretending they aren’t keeping close eyes on Tessa and Kaitlyn, laughing together a few meters away. 

“Fuck, I’m glad this season’s done,” yells Poje over the music, lifting his glass to his lips.  
“Oh. Fuck yeah,” replies Scott. He nods slowly to emphasize his agreement. 

But his eyes don’t deviate from Tessa. She’s wearing some black dress - has he seen this one before? God only knows. It has hole-type-things that show little bits of her torso, and fringe at the bottom that swings around as she moves.  
It’s makes for good watching.  
It helps him- somewhat- forget that 20 minutes earlier, when he’d leaned in to ask if she wanted another drink, she’d deftly dodged the hand he was moving to the small of her back.  
Or maybe the dress was actually a painful reminder that.  
Either way, apparently, saying I love you wasn’t going to change much.  
He shudders, trying to forget. This is so fucked up. 

Suddenly, Tessa and Kaitlyn both get excited about a song that begins blaring over the loudspeaker.  
It starts with a ghostly wail.  
_Maybe Gabi’s into this one, too_ , he thinks absently, mildly puzzled, watching Tessa and Kaitlyn lock eyes and start singing excitedly to each other.  
He and Poje take a few steps toward them without really meaning to.

Then the bass kicks in, throbbing, and it seems less like a Gabi song, and more like something ...popular. But cool. Good.  
A very sultry voice booms through the room.

“Stars on Ice?!” he calls to them, screwing up his face, like an old man trying to make sense of the kids these days.  
Tessa and Kaitlyn pause, look from Scott to each other, and erupt in laughter.  
“Cigars on ice!” shouts Kaitlyn over the music. “You don’t know this song? Beyonce??”  
She’s clearly horrified.

He shakes his head, shrugging unapologetically. Not a clue.  
He looks to Tessa for her reaction, and she’s still laughing.  
So beautiful. Fuck.  
And then she’s singing straight at him, hand over her heart.  
“Drunk in loooooooooooveeeeee”.  
He laughs at her. But he feels like crying. This is physically painful.  
Drunk. In love.  
_Jesus Christ_ , is all he can think.


End file.
